Eldritch Designs
by MaeceusMan
Summary: Inspired by "Its a Dangerous Business, Going Out Your Door", this story is of an epic pony war in the not-so-distant future. War was never meant to come to Equestria. But it came, and with it, everything changed. Years have past since the smiling days; since Princess Twilight was forced to assume the throne. An ancient danger awakens, and heroes emerge from the dark.
1. Unexpected Guests

Twilight Sparkle sat dozing, slumped over the latest reports from the front. Across from her in the steel reinforced concrete room, surrounded by charts, maps, and reports, sat Rainbow Dash, silently musing.

Rainbow knew the urgency of their situation quite well, but also knew that the pressures of the war were getting to Twilight, and for her to be getting any sleep at all, even if it was only a light doze, was only a good thing. And so she said nothing, going over again in her head the intricacies of their planned aerial assault on a fortified enemy outpost.

She wore streamlined navy blue battle fatigues which were a far cry from the old days. Back then, her cerulean coat and vibrant rainbow colored mane were all she had needed to distinguish herself from those around her. True, nopony was ever going to mistake her for anypony else, but military life made the need for a uniform apparent. If the troops had to wear one, then so did she.

Though she certainly didn't wear her uniform to any degree of professionalism now; her jacket was unceremoniously tossed in a corner, hiding the lightning bolt crest that signified her rank of General. Her slacks needed an ironing, she hooves needed a polish, and even her mane needed a good brush. How she loved being off duty!

An alarm blared up at the surface, the wail near imperceptible as it carried through the many fortified rooms of the reinforced mountain bunker, down to its deepest levels. Rainbow could just to say make it out from the Command Bunker they were currently in, deep in the crystal caves beneath Old Canterlot.

She sighed, stifling a groan. That alarm was meant to signify an incoming squad of enemy bombers, who had been dropping their bombs at more or less the same time of day these last few weeks in an attempt to build dread while lessening morale, though she just used it as a clock.

That wasn't why she sighed, though. She sighed because if it was 5:00pm already, then her Lieutenant would be here any second with the latest reports. The reports themselves might be no better or worse than usual, but she had really hoped that Twilight could get a few minutes sleep in at the least, but the time and military regularity virtually guaranteed that was not about to happen.

Sure enough, the quick series of hollow bangs came from the metal door, and Twilight awoke with a start.

"Come in." Twilight intoned, apparently unaware she had been doing anything but studying the reports spread in front of her.

The door opened on smooth hinges, and sure enough Lieutenant Pip entered, buttons gleaming on his military regalia.

Pipsqueak was small for his age. He looked to be a lanky teen, despite the fact he had in fact grown to become a stallion. Between the brown patches on his white coat and his thin, wiry muscles, he always gave the illusion of being both slightly ill and underfed, while actually being neither. His double breasted red vest and crescent moon badge of rank were kept immaculately clean and polished, no doubt in some deep seated hope that his military regalia made him look more intimidating.

The truth was he was still the same, fun loving colt he had been back in Ponyville, or even Trottingham. Though the last few years _had_ been hard on him, and in truth even he probably couldn't have said how deeply that side of him had been buried by years of warfare and loss.

"Princess Twilight, General Dash," the Lieutenant said, bowing toward Twilight before raising his hoof in a crisp salute to his commanding officer.

Returning the salute, Rainbow enquired, concern etching her voice. "What news from the front Lieutenant? Have they been found yet?"

The look on the Lieutenant's face answered the question before the words even left his mouth. "No such luck, ma'am. Neither Discord nor Agent Pie have been heard from since their mission began three weeks ago."

Twilight frowned in concern, dark thoughts flying through her mind. Three weeks was far too long for comfort, especially for a pony as fastidious as her.

Her outfit reflected her current mood. It was a simple dress of fine dark wool, in a shade of blue just shy of black. The hem and neck were lace, in a pattern of simple constellations - an outfit that in Rainbow's mind brought back images of a long ago Gala. Twilight had had the outfit commissioned as part of her current wardrobe: namely practical outfits for a still-growing alicorn princess in war time.

In a way, Rainbow still had trouble believing that Twilight had become an alicorn, though every sign was in front of her. Twilight was now a good half a hoof taller than she had once been, and all of her features seemed to have stretched out, especially in the neck and legs. Her wings were growing faster still, in direct relation to her growing skill at flying, for which Rainbow felt she deserved a fair bit of credit. And even in these breezeless tunnels, her mane occasionally seemed to blow in a nonexistent breeze.

Twilight took a deep breath, steadying herself against thoughts of what could have become of Pinkie and Discord, before replying: "Celestia willing, they succeeded. The chaos those two together could weave through those enemy lines may just make the difference we need."

Rainbow nodded in agreement. As hard as it had been to send those two into harm's way, there had been no denying the potential gain that the chaos magic they wielded could bring. Plus, there were no two less likely to be captured if discovered than they.

"Celestia will it to be so." Pip hastily added in agreement. "Speaking of which, you are both needed in the War Room immediately. The Three have arrived, and they wish to speak with you at once."

Rising quickly from their stools, the two shared a quick look of shock and confusion as they followed Lieutenant Pip to the War Room. The last time the Three had spoken to anypony outside the church had been as a tearful farewell before beginning their now constant vigil. A quick stream of questions from Twilight and Rainbow bombarded Pip as they quickly made their way along narrow pathways and down tight staircases carved from the bedrock. The Lieutenant however, refused to say more, insisting that it was beyond his words to explain; that they would simply have to see for themselves.

Rainbow was concerned. Not only had Pip referred to the Three with an almost superstitious awe, but the last time somepony had insisted that they see a matter of importance with their own eyes, the six friends had had the horror of witnessing Canterlot Castle's destruction, arching blasts of magical energy cascading into the air. On top of that, there had been that rumor of an attack on the royal family.

And then came the ley-line. She could still remember vividly the first time she saw it, that massive wall of energy, stretching off as far as she could see to the north and west, as it kept up its inexorable expansion towards Manehatten. She remembered flying as high as her wings would allow, following the line of energy with her eyes to the ley-line's source, and realizing with horror that the line had already cut Gildedale in half.

Seeing the intense frown on her friend's face, Rainbow Dash asked, "You thinking about Celestia and the others?"

Not saying a word, Twilight nodded in confirmation, looking to be almost on the verge of tears.

Tensing, Rainbow felt her mind race. Twilight was clearly not in a fit state to deal with a reunion like this right now. In a desperate gambit, Rainbow said aloud the first thing that came to mind, "Do you remember the last time I saw Niles Nigellus?"

Pausing, Twilight turned towards Rainbow and nodded, an eyebrow raised in question.

"I lied about that, ya know." Rainbow took a deep breath before continuing. "We didn't really break up. We actually continued to meet in the Dreaming for a few more months before we decided to stop seeing each other."

Clearly curious, Twilight asked, "You know Rainbow, as much as I liked seeing you two together, I never really understood it. I mean, you two were from different species. How did that even work?"

Rainbow shrugged, blushing slightly and saying, "It actually worked better that way. In the Dreaming, we could be anything we wanted. The body is only an extension of the mind after all..." Her voice trailed off into silence, lost in memory.

"Thanks for telling me, Rainbow," Twilight said quietly. "I had always blamed myself for you two having to break up when the Pronghorn broke all contact with us as the war started."

Rainbow nodded, not making eye contact. "I'm sorry I never told you; we just agreed to keep it a secret all these years, else we risked the label of the Pronghorns as a neutral party to events. And before you ask, we met again a couple weeks back and had a long talk, before we finally agreed to come clean about the whole thing to those on our own ends. I had just thought Niles was tired of living a lie, but with the Three showing up here today, I have to wonder if maybe he knows something that we don't. Or if the Pronghorns are no longer a neutral party to this war..."

"Maybe..." Twilight said thoughtfully. "At the very least, if it is related, we should know soon enough."

Twilight hesitated before adding, "Why did you really break up, if you don't mind me asking?"

Rainbow paused in thought before answering. Finally, she said, "It turns out being from different species is just too big a difference in the long run."

Nodding to herself as though no more needed saying, they continued trotting along the hallways in silence. That's when Rainbow realized with a start that Twilight Sparkle, for the first time in far too long, was smiling. _And it's about time too, _Rainbow thought. Finally passing the final security checkpoint, they had arrived at the War Room. And what Rainbow Dash saw in that room tore all thoughts of the Dreaming, Ley-Lines, and even the distant rumble of falling bombs high above them far from her mind.

•

The War Room was aptly named. Not only was it the largest room of the entire complex, built from a naturally forming cave in the deepest levels of the crystal dungeons of Old Canterlot; its large oval shape and gently sloping sides had made it a natural fit for both planning military strategy as well as for holding public forums with the civilian bunker's populous.

Coming down from a side entrance reserved for high ranking military officers, Rainbow Dash released a breath she hadn't realized she had been holding. Even after all these years, it was still a relief to be out of those confining, narrow hallways. Looking around, she blinked in surprise. Not at the room itself: she had been in it a hundred times before. The steps were still carved into the sides of the rock, giving the room the appearance of a giant amphitheater to Rainbow.

No, what surprised Rainbow Dash was what now occupied the center of the large room. Normally reserved for meetings of high ranking officers planning battle tactics, the center of the room instead had been cleared to make room for their unexpected guests.

Coming to stand before them, Twilight inclined her head, quickly followed by Rainbow, who was beginning to wish she had thought to bring her jacket for the occasion.

The Three, standing a good thirty hooves tall and glowing like miniature suns, wearing only a simple ring of gold atop each of their heads, intoned as one, "**_It Is Good To See You Both Again, Twilight Sparkle And Rainbow Dash. It Has Been Far Too Long._**" The voices they spoke with were both the familiar voices the two had known from so long ago, and yet they were slightly off, warbled as though spoken from underwater, as if all traces of who they had been were stripped away.

Twilight replied, voice shaking. "When I heard you had come," She said with a quick sniff, tears streaming down her face. "I guess I had hoped to see you all in the flesh, and that this nightmare you are living through would finally be over."

As one the Three intoned, "**_We Do Not See It As Such, Twilight Sparkle. To Be As We Is To See The World As It Truly Is._**"

"Then why do you only speak together?!" She was practically screaming at the apparitions now, tears freely falling down her face. "Why can't you understand how much I miss you and need you and want you back? Or that I am so terrified you are really all dead; that I am speaking to nothing but ghosts?! FOR CELESTIAS SAKE, YOU WON'T EVEN LOOK AT ME!"

Rainbow was stunned by the tirade, though she knew that Twilight had been keeping these emotions bottled up for most of eleven years now. If the Three had finally grown strong enough to project avatars and speak face to face, rather than going through those cursed Priests of the Celestian Shrine as they always had before, then she was glad that Twilight was finally being given that chance. So much so that she didn't even bother giving them her own two bits, as much as she would have liked to.

After a moment of silence, as though in silent deliberation, the Three ceased staring off into their nameless void and looked straight down at the two of them. And then they sang. It was a haunting song, lyricless and fluid. Rainbow Dash was sure she had never heard its like before.

As the song continued, the Three's voices seemed to shift in the air, as if their glowing bodies each suddenly became a source of the song, as opposed to it emanating from the very walls of the War Room like it had at first, and the lights around them began to dim. Even their presences seemed to diminish as the song continued, until by the time the song ended it both looked and felt as though three ponies stood before them, glowing faintly in the respective colors of their coats, rather than as the mind-warping beings of light, sound, and presence that had seemed to fill the room to bursting before.

"By Celestia and the Blessing of the Three," came a voice from behind them. Rainbow whirled around, outrage filling her battle hardened eyes at the intrusion, only to find the Lieutenant standing there, his eyes transfixed with wonder at the sight before him. Upon realizing his commanding officer, the princess, and the Three themselves all staring at him, Pip began to bow, salute, and kiss the floor all at the same time. As a result, all he achieved was to topple over, hitting the floor with a grunt.

Before he so could so much as decide whether to kiss the floor some more or stand at attention again, Rainbow Dash had marched up, staring down at him, her face harder than the stone of the walls around them.

Before either of them had a chance to speak however, the violet-colored glow of Princess Luna spoke. "My greetings to you, child," she said. "Know that we are grateful for the strength your prayers give to us, and that you will be forever marked for having stood in our presence. But I must with great sorrow ask you to leave us, as we have been far too long delayed in speaking with these two, and we would do right by them, given the opportunity."

Standing quickly, Pip paled as he bowed again to Princess Luna, and quickly started bowing his way out of the room, all the while praising the Three in all of Their Divine Glory, while avoiding the eye of his commanding officer. Finally, with a closing door echoing through the large room, he was gone, with five sets of eyes staring after him.

The rumble of a particularly strong explosion on the surface quickly snapped the group out of their momentary stupor. Luna spoke again, turning to look back at the others. "Oh never mind him you two, I guess after all these years I am still his favorite princess."

A brief smile touched her lips as she continued. "Princess Twilight Sparkle. General Rainbow Dash. I trust you know we had never intended to cause you any undue distress in the length of our absence from this world. The lives we have saved through our actions alone are worth any price we might ourselves be paying. My sister and I had known this might one day come to pass; I am simply glad that we three were able to enact the plan before even more were hurt."

"Indeed," came agreement from the pink glow of Princess Cadance. "As much as it pains me to leave the crystal ponies," her hair unconsciously formed into a crystal headdress at the thought, "I know in the end that my decision was the right one. Twilight, Rainbow Dash. You two know how glad I am to see you both, and I really do wish there was more we could do to help you against this Shadow character we have been hearing about from the priests. After all these years since he united the rebel factions, have you learned anything about who he is or where he came from?"

Rainbow stood in silence, waiting and watching. She herself had never learned the origin or anything of value about the Shadow, or even proof he really existed. In fact, before they stood before her today, she hadn't even believed these three had been really speaking to those so called priests. Though clearly she had been wrong on that point. And if she was wrong about that, she could certainly be wrong about the existence of this so-called Shadow as well. And all that aside, these three had come to see Twilight more than her, she really had no illusions about that. And thus, Rainbow left the talking to Twilight, the soon-to-be-reprimanded Lieutenant filling her thoughts.

Since her outburst at the Three, Twilight had stood quietly, thought clearly still fuming. And yet by the time Pip had left and Luna began to speak, Twilight had calmed down substantially. As Cadance asked her question, the last of Twilight's tears dried up, and she began to look more like her old self.

Regret in her voice, Twilight answered her old foalsitter, saying, "I wish I knew, Cadance. I haven't received more than a third-hoofed account of the Shadow. He is definitely a unicorn, and if even half the rumors about him are true, his powers are formidable to say the least. And given how quickly he rallied those former rebel groups under his banner, he can either use his magic to control other's thoughts, or his tongue is as dangerous as his horn. The only other piece of information I have heard regarding him is a rumor regarding that horn. My sources say he wears a hollowed out larger unicorn horn over his own, and apparently the Shadow claims it to be the horn of King Sombra himself."

Shock and quiet murmurings passes among the three; purple, pink and white glows intensifying with concern. Clearly they had not heard that particular rumor before. Finally, Luna turned back from the others, saying, "An unfortunate turn of events if true. We shall look into the potential consequences and let you know as soon as possible what we find."

Twilight nodded, her mind already moving past the issue. She turned from Luna to stare at the middle of the three ponies, glowing white in the large room. With a start, Rainbow Dash realized that Twilight had fresh tears forming in her glistening eyes. "And what about you?" Twilight asked. "Why don't you speak? Haven't you anything to say to me after all this time?"

The final glowing apparition nodded, proudly staring down with tears in its own eyes. After a deep breath, Prince Shining Armor said, "Of course I do. I love you, Twily. I am so proud of everything you have done and I miss you more and more every day."

•

Stepping into the hallway, Pip was stunned. _I can't believe I just did that,_ he thought. _I just embarrassed myself in front of my commanding officer, one prince, and three princesses! And the Three had stood there, not even using priests to speak anymore!_

Taking a deep breath, he went over the last few minutes in his head again.

He had been in his office, preparing for the briefing at 1700 hours, and a panicked aide had galloped in, yelling about the Three reportedly having arrived in the War Room where they were waiting for the princess and general to speak with them immediately.

_How could this be?_ he had wondered. Surely the priests would expect normal protocol to be followed. Though if he hadn't known they were coming, it could only mean a surprise inspection of the church, or an urgent matter that couldn't afford to wait for formality. But they had called for the princess and general specifically, which certainly ruled out the former possibility.

He had galloped around the offices, giving orders to panicked orderlies to find out who had failed to warn him before the priests had arrived unannounced. Even if they had been teleported in with outside assistance, they would still have had to go through all the necessary checkpoints, and even then they would never have been allowed into the War Room. On top of that, the priests had a small emergency stash of bottled dragon's flame that they had been provided to notify the princess with in the event that something was wrong with the shield they had taken over supervision of as a part of a 'religious necessity'.

Of course it had not taken long for Pip to learn that the Three were actually projecting images of themselves through some type of powerful magic, and had actually appeared in the War Room because it was the only room large enough for the three to appear in. So he had calmed down, pulled himself together, and used all the cool military presence he had at his disposal as he had found Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash and told them to follow him. Of course, had he been calmer he was sure he could have answered some of their questions.

_So what happened? _he asked himself again. _I left them alone with the Three, standing outside, making idle chit chat with the guard..._

His head jerking up, Pip whirled around. The guard in question was a white colt with a silver mane garbed in the traditional golden armor of the Canterlot Royal Guard guarding the door. "Private Diamond Dust!" he demanded. "What happened? We were talking, and the next thing I know I'm in the War Room, being spoken to by Princess Luna herself!"

The young colt stood at attention, though he looked concerned as he answered. "I don't know sir, singing of some kind came from the War Room, and you stopped talking mid-sentence, turned to the door, and entered with a creepy smile on your face."

In emulation he put a wide eyed smile on his face, teeth bared in what could almost have been called a grimace.

Resetting his face, he continued. "You ignored me like I wasn't even in the room anymore, and kept repeating something to yourself before you entered the War Room."

With growing alarm, Pip asked, "What did I say?"

The concern reappeared on Diamond Dust's face as he answered. "You were saying, 'Take the apple, leave the tea.' It didn't make any sense, but if you ask me, I would say you just had a small nervous breakdown from having the most powerful ponies in Equestria meet up next door to you with no advanced notice. If I may suggest sir, perhaps you should take it easy for a day or two?"

Nodding absently, Pip headed off, confused, worried, and deep in troubled thoughts. He had somepony he needed to see.


	2. The Emerald Light

_Transistors, vacuum tube diodes, cables, switches, transformer, more cables, and a few spare resistors. Yep... that should be enough... wait, isn't there also a... ah, here it is, my... oh wait, I never came up with a name for this thing, what should I call you, mister something? A... well it holds energy over time, so I guess an energyizer, capa...capacity? Capacityor... a capacitor! Yep, that's perfect! Okay, and a couple capacitors. So that means... I dunno, Apple Bloom, maybe this won't even... oh Tartarus, worst it could do is burn out again... wait... what was that sound?_

Looking up from her work desk, Apple Bloom blinked to get her eyes to focus at a distance. And they did, bringing the vast contraptions of her workshop into sharp relief. Coils of copper cables and vacuum tubes larger than Big Mac himself were sprawled around the well-lit room amid broken relics from ancient storerooms half taken apart in study, and even some of her own machines sent back to her for repairs.

Listening, however, brought no change. The place was as quiet as ever. Well, save for the rather large steam engines pumping fresh air to the lower levels of the Command Bunker next door through the wall on one side and the hum of the transformers converting lightning down to usable energy levels through the other.

She had grown so used to those sounds they didn't even register as noise to her anymore. Of course, if Rainbow Dash's so called 'shock troops' stopped training with those lightning blasts at her transformers for very long, she would grow aware of it very quickly. Not so much due to the sudden lack of the hum and crackling noises that came with their work but because the lights would go out, she admitted to herself with a chuckle. _Unless I can figure out how to hold onto that lightning for a longer period of time with some kind of larger version of this capacitor thing..._

She froze. Again she heard the noise that had snapped her out of her concentration. A metallic ding, high pitched and far off, but audible, even over the din.

Apple Bloom rose from her stool, flexing stiff muscles. She was a fairly tall mare, though her muscles were more developed for machine shop work than from years toiling on the farm like her older sister's were. Her eyes were the color of golden delicious apples freshly picked from the tree, her red hair held back by a pink kerchief tied in a small bow. And she wore a heavy, dark wool apron at the moment, a matter of workshop safety more than a statement of fashion.

_If a nut has gotten loose on that filly's project, the whole thing could tear itself apart! _she thought with growing concern. _And yet, no yell of alarm coming from my assistant - what is she doing?_

"Pumpkin Cake!" Apple Bloom hollered, wiping grease off her front hooves with a cloth not much cleaner. "Girl, where are you?"

"Up here, Apple Bloom!" came a youthful voice from the front of the workshop. "At the front! You've got a guest! It's the Lieutenant!"

Apple Bloom jumped in surprise. _This is unexpected! _She thought with some excitement. _He never comes by to inspect my progress himself! True, I have made some great stuff lately, but I don't have anything new to present at the moment... unless, could he have come by just to see me?_

She shook her head to clear such thoughts from her mind. _Surely not_, she thought. _He's too professional for something like that._

Still, the thought persisted, a Parasprite of her mind, consuming all other thoughts as it grew.

Another metallic ding echoed from Pumpkin Cake's part of the workshop, snapping her out of her trance completely.

"All well and good Pumpkin Cake, I'll be along in a moment, but shouldn't you be mindin' that crystal device? It sounds like the central shaft might be sliding, and if that thing breaks 'cause you weren't doing your job..." Apple Bloom let the threat hang empty in the air. She wasn't going to do anything if it broke, not really, but this was more Pumpkin's invention than her own, and it really did show promise if it worked.

A quick squeal and the sound of drumming hooves was her only response, as Pumpkin Cake practically galloped to her part of the workshop to check on the device.

Trotting towards the front, Apple Bloom couldn't help pausing to eye over her reflection in a polished sheet of steel that hung on the wall, acting as a makeshift mirror. The face that looked back at her seemed as surprised as she was to see that somehow she was all but covered in engine grease. Stifling a groan, she made a go at cleaning up, though her cloth seemed to push the grease around more than remove any of it. Finally admitting defeat, she found her eyes drawn to the apple and wrench cutie mark on her flank. The tale behind that mark always made her smile.

Quickly straightening her mane, she checked her reflection again. Nodding in satisfaction, she trotted the rest of the way to the front of the workshop, resisting a sudden urge to canter.

•

"You don't understand Pip," Pumpkin Cake was saying desperately. "I can't just sit by and do nothing!"

Pip couldn't believe it. Pumpkin Cake picks _today_ to harass him about her brother wanting into the military, when all Pip had come for was a quick word with her mentor? And yet he was somehow supposed to make sure that Pound Cake is _not_ put on the front lines where they were the most desperately in need of new recruits? Not to mention the fact that front line, able bodied pegasi could easily be trained to drop bombs or if they were skilled enough, to take out enemy fliers in air-to-air pegafights?

"You do realize the air is the safest location on the front line, don't you, Pumpkin Cake?" he asked with incredulity. "Short of the occasional dog fight, air troops are essentially unmolested in combat. Most soldiers I know would trade both their back legs for a set of wings! That aerial safety is the whole reason everypony hides in bunkers during these daily bomb raids! We can't stop them!"

Pip stood panting by the door to the workshop, surprised at how riled up this request had gotten him. Here he was trying to find out what his trance could mean and instead he was taking his stress out on a filly who was only worrying about her twin brother.

"I'm sorry, Pumpkin Cake," he said, acquiescing. "I guess I have a lot on my mind right now."

Pumpkin Cake nodded slowly, anxiously chewing on a loose strand of hair from the copper colored bun atop her head - an age-old habit she never seemed able to break. "It's all right," she said. "I realize I'm asking a lot, but he's my brother, and if I don't look out for his best interests, nopony will."

She paused hesitantly, then continued, her face growing hard: "I have worked under Apple Bloom for a while now. I know that the military is her largest financer, and they are hoping for weapons of war. Even if it is classified, I know enough about science to see the kinds of weapons this war is creating."

He opened his mouth to deny knowing what she was talking about, but she cut him off, yelling, "So _don't you_ _dare_ give me that propaganda about how safe the skies are on the front lines! _We both know _those skies will not be safe for much longer!"

Pip was stunned, but also impressed. Clearly Pumpkin Cake acted out of love for her brother, but she seemed to have an awareness of the world that was unusual for a pony who had lived most of her life in fear of another ley surge.

_If her brother is as sharp as she is, _he thought with excitement,_ he may be officer material! That will get him off the front lines..._

"Okay Pumpkin Cake, I'll talk to your parents tomorrow at their shop in Ponyville. It's my day off anyways and I really have been meaning to go to town. If your brother really does have his heart set on a military life, your parents really can't do anything to stop him when you both come of age next week. At the very least, I will make sure they understand that he will need their support if he joins up. And who knows? Maybe I can pull some strings for him. We'll see."

It wasn't really a promise, he supposed. The war needed every available recruit they could get their hooves on these days, since the princess insisted that a draft was out of the question. Of course, she hadn't said anything against using propaganda or recruitment fairs, so that was something. Plus, whether they lived on the surface in Ponyville and used the princess's public bunkers, or they lived in the permanent civilian bunkers that dotted the mountainside, getting bombed regularly had a funny way of bringing in those who wanted to protect their loved ones.

And now that he thought about it, Pumpkin Cake had been right to ask him. Pip could probably keep Pound Cake off the front lines if he called in some favors or had him tested for officer potential, though if we was going to stick his neck out for this young colt, he wanted to meet him face to face first, and see if he was worthy of the special interest.

And all that aside, his real interest now lay in this young mare in front of him. If she was this sharp at her age, she could do very well in weapons research one day. Especially if she her theories about magic crystallography bore any fruit.

Suddenly, Apple Bloom's voice arose from the back of the workshop. "Pumpkin Cake! Girl, where are you?"

Pumpkin Cake's head swung around so quickly at the voice of her mentor, her hair almost came undone.

"Up here, Apple Bloom!" she replied in a loud voice. "At the front! You've got a guest! It's the Lieutenant!"

Pip had no idea how Pumpkin Cake could make out Apple Bloom's reply over the din, let alone what her mentor was talking about in reply, but the young mare's face grew paler by the word, apparently realizing how long she had been away from her duties.

Turning back to face him, she bowed slightly, giving a rushed apology that she must return to work at once, but with assurances that Apple Bloom would be here to see him momentarily. As she rushed off to those duties, she yelled back to him her thanks, and that they looked forward to seeing him soon.

_Subtle. _He thought with a wry chuckle. _She might do well in politics, too._

•

Pumpkin Cake wasn't sure if she was more excited, nervous, or annoyed.

Everypony knew that Lieutenant Pip spoke with General Rainbow Dash and Princess Twilight Sparkle on a regular basis. _As if he couldn't take a minute to ask them to keep her brother stationed somewhere safe! _she thought bitterly. The princess at least was nice, and Rainbow Dash was still a living legend, even bordering on superhero in the minds of the young ponies she knew. Surely they would have understood and helped.

She knew it was probably a hopeless cause, asking for something like that when the war desperately needed troops. The crude propaganda that permeated life in Ponyville these days was proof enough of that.

And on top of that, she had almost destroyed a machine that had cost her quite a bit of grant money just to prototype, and all because she wasn't at her post for the final test! Lucky that Apple Bloom had been watching out for her, like always. Pumpkin Cake really did consider herself lucky to have somepony as great as Apple Bloom as her mentor.

Of course, none of that meant anything if she couldn't fix this...

Upon rushing to her private area of the workshop, she found her machine to be on the verge of self destruction.

The machine was sizable, about the size of a male buffalo she had once seen in a refugee center a few years back, though it certainly looked nothing like one.

It was a mounding mass of cables and wires, vacuum tubes and arching electricity. But that wasn't what drew the eye. What made this machine different from all the others in the workshop was the source of all that grant money, the gems it was both covered and filled with. Red and blue and yellow and green and pink, they didn't just twinkle in the overhead lights, they glowed with a light all their own.

She had found years ago that she could take the potential residual magic her horn channeled and store it within gems. In fact, she found that the gems shone with light so intensely they could be seen through solid objects when she cast a particular spell near them. Imagine her shock to discover that the Lady Rarity, the Element of Generosity herself, had known about this since she was a filly, and had only used the knowledge to collect gems for use in clothing! As decorations, no less!

She still had trouble believing it at times. But unlike Lady Rarity, Pumpkin Cake had realized that this meant that gems and crystals could be used as conduits for storing magic. When she later saw the electrical wonders that Apple Bloom had created, she had finally realized the implications of her discovery, and she had gained her cutie mark, a collection of glowing gems radiating waves of colorful light, on the spot.

Naturally, she had become apprentice to Apple Bloom as quickly as she was able to after that. It wasn't hard really, once she had explained her theories about using crystals as conduits to control magic and her belief that Apple Bloom's electricity seemed to follow a similar natural law.

And yet here she was, running what had promised to be the last in a long series of stress tests before her machine was to be tried at full strength as intended, and she had almost blown it due to a loose nut!

It was the worst possible nut to have gone loose as well, in what could only be described as a textbook example of Murphy's Law.

_Anything that can go wrong will, and at the worst possible time, _she quoted to herself, as she carefully drained the excess magic out of the input crystal, turning the machine off.

She only dared to use hand tools in the vicinity of this device: she did not want to risk causing an unintended reaction with the crystals. So she pulled out a wrench, and carefully tightened the nut in question by hoof.

The centerpiece of her device was a large, carved emerald shaped in what was known as a princess cut, and the nut that had come loose was the one that held the rod keeping that centerpiece firmly in place. When she had come back to check on the machine, that emerald had been slowly rotating on its stand, with each rotation it rubbed against a ruby she was using as a power conduit, sending off a shower of sparks, causing a loud metallic dinging sound and releasing a whiff of ozone.

She looked over the machine in concern. The emerald and the ruby both looked the same as before. No apparent scratches or blemishes. She breathed a sigh of relief. Any damage to her gems would have made them a danger to use, she was sure. And she certainly could not have afforded to buy replacement gems for at least a few months.

She was also sure the color, clarity, size, and cut of the gems were all as crucial to how the machine functioned as transistors, resistors, and vacuum tubes were to Apple Bloom's machines, but until she could identify which combination produced useful results, she supposed that she was really just guessing, but that emerald was the largest she had been able to get her hands on, not to mention the clearest.

_Plus_, she mused privately, _a princess cut just seems like a good omen to me._

Sighing, she wiped the sweat from her brow with a hoof. At last, the nut was twisted tightly in place, and everything looked right.

With a quick surge of focused magic, she recharged the input crystal, turning the machine back on, intending to finally finish this last stress test.

The machine hummed to life, louder than she had ever heard it before.

And that's when Pumpkin Cake realized with shock that without thinking she had fully charged the input crystal, and the device was now running at full strength.

The last thing she remembered before a blinding green light erupted from the emerald centerpiece of her invention, tearing all thought from her mind, was the sound of her own voice, saying simply, "Murphy's Law indeed..."

•

Again, Pip found that his day was not going as planned.

It was supposed to have been a simple rendezvous to Apple Bloom's workshop, to find the pony most likely to know where he could find Applejack, who wasn't working today.

He was convinced the 'apple' he spoke of in his bizarre trance had to refer to one of those sisters, and if he had been a betting stallion, he would have put his money on the Element of Honesty wielding, truth-sensing, home-front coordinator.

Instead he was in a hospital waiting room on the surface about a mile from the workshop, trying to comfort Mr. and Mrs. Cake. Their son was pacing the tiled floor anxiously while his sister was in the back, getting looked over by doctors.

"Just tell us this Pipsqu-," Carrot Cake hesitated, lines creasing his worried face. "Sorry, Lieutenant. I, that is to say we," he said, putting an arm around his wife who was softly crying, "know that Pumpkin Cake is involved in potentially ground breaking research, and we couldn't be more proud of her, but we also know that that workshop invents new weapons that are used in the war. So I have to ask, did one of those," he paused again, this time for lack of the right word to use, "those _things_, hurt my little Pumpkin?"

Pip paused a moment before replying, considering. He could not reveal top secret military weapons research to the Cake's, but at the same time, he considered these two as family friends from all those years ago in Ponyville. And on top of that, he had promised Pumpkin Cake that he would talk to them about their son, who wanted to join the military himself, and there was hardly a better time than now, while they stood in front of him.

Finally, reaching a decision, he spoke.

"I had gone down to the workshop to research an unrelated matter, and I spoke with your daughter. She was apparently, as I understand it from speaking with Apple Bloom, on the verge of a major breakthrough in her studies. We spoke for a bit, and she went back to make some kind of adjustment to her device."

He hesitated, deciding to skip what he had spoken with Apple Bloom about, before continuing: "The next thing I know, the workshop was engulfed in an intense green light. Apple Bloom and I ran over to the source, only to find Pumpkin Cake sitting next to a large machine covered in twinkling crystals, which Apple Bloom identified as the crystal device your daughter had been working on. The green light seemed to have come from a large emerald in the center of the device, which was brightly glowing."

He could still see it clearly, with arching waves of dark green magic stretching from the emerald, orbiting around Pumpkin Cake in a dance of lights, before returning to the emerald, an otherworldly hum emanating from the device.

Pumpkin Cake had just been sitting there, staring into the large emerald with a look of pure rapture on her face, her pupils fully dilated, her eyes - rather than their regular shade of blue - were glowing in the same intense shade of green as the emerald.

Shuddering, he continued, choosing to leave those details out. "The device appeared to be doing something to Pumpkin Cake, so acting quickly, Apple Bloom grabbed a small black gem attached to the end of a silver rod, and touched it to a few of the gems in the device, which according to her would siphon excess power from the device. Sure enough, the emerald dimmed. Apple Bloom said it would be safe to move Pumpkin Cake, so I called the EMT's, and had her rushed straight here."

Of course, he also chose not to mention Pumpkin Cake screaming while the device powered off, before passing out. He had a bad feeling that scream would haunt his nightmares for a long time to come.

Shuddering to himself yet again, he finished the story: "Apple Bloom is back in the workshop with a couple of my soldiers, checking over the device to try and figure out what happened and what it may have been doing to Pumpkin Cake. Other than that, I'm afraid that all we can do is wait."

He paused again, hesitating, uncertain how to proceed. Finally, he pressed on. He owed Pumpkin Cake that.

"There is one final thing," he said, nodding towards the still-pacing pegasus on the other side of the room. "I understand that Pound Cake has been planning to join the military when he comes of age next week." The Cakes stiffened. Before either one of them could say anything however, he rushed on: "If he still wants to join after this, I will personally do my best to keep him safe. You have my word on that."

It was the least he could do, he supposed. Pip had been the last to speak to Pumpkin Cake before this had happened to her. He knew it wasn't his fault, but even so he felt awful. And it only seemed like the right thing to do, given the circumstances. These two really did not need to worry about their son on top of everything else.

The grateful looks the Cakes gave him did make him feel a bit better, yet not as much as he would have liked. He paused, hesitating one final time before adding, "And I am sorry about Pumpkin Cake. I really do hope she is all right."

Before he could say another word, a teary eyed Cup Cake gave him a hug, which Pip returned awkwardly. As a soldier he really wasn't used to such things.

Releasing her, he gave them an apologetic smile, before saying: "Now if you will please excuse me, I have other matters I must attend to, but I'll be back to check on things here in a little bit."

Nodding to himself as though nothing more needed saying, he trotted off, the sound of Mrs. Cake soft crying the only thing to follow him as he left the hospital.

•

_But this doesn't make any sense, _Apple Bloom thought with growing concern._ Where is this thing getting its power from without a unicorn powering it?_

She was still in her workshop, going over every inch of Pumpkin Cake's device with the two unicorns Pip had sent to help her. And she was growing more nervous by the minute.

Since Pumpkin Cake had been rushed off, Apple Bloom had looked over everything. She had drained off the magic with the black drain crystal and the device was inert, yet for some reason in the last few minutes the large emerald in the center of the device had been getting brighter again.

She couldn't understand it. This violated every natural law she had ever known. The device was drawing magic from - well, from nothing!

Her ears perked up at a dreadfully familiar sound. The device had started making its ghostly humming noise again.

"No good!" she said aloud, "I think the device is about to activate again. You two, drop everything and make for the exit, NOW!"

Without hesitation, the two unicorns set down the tools they had been holding, turned around, and bolted with Apple Bloom following not a second behind.

As they burst through the exit, the room filled abruptly with a blinding, green light.

Laying on the floor of the hallway, Apple Bloom was panting from the exertion of the unexpected sprint.

Standing up, she looked around. Both of Pip's soldiers had made it out, neither one looking the least bit winded at all.

The leader of the two, a stocky gray mare with a black mane, was looking down either side of the hallway they now stood in, as if she expected a sudden attack, while the other, a pink-maned teal colt, was looking back toward the workshop with concern, his face awash in a rippling green light.

Apple Bloom turned back to the workshop herself, and gasped.

Through the open door, every square hoof of the workshop was glowing in an intense, emerald shade of green. And what was more, it appeared as though the light stopped in mid air at the door, making a solid wall.

"What is it?" the teal unicorn asked in a surprisingly flowery voice. "It looks so... solid!"

Apple Bloom had to agree. It did look solid. But being the practical pony that she was, she resolved to quickly find out. Reaching into the front pocket of the apron she had still forgotten to take off from before, she found a loose screw. Hesitating for only a moment, she threw it at the door, only to see a shower of green sparks and an intense flash of green light; a metallic odor suddenly filled the hall. When her eyes cleared, the screw was nowhere to be seen. And the green wall of light still stood there, undisturbed.

"A force field!" she gasped, unable to believe her eyes. "They normally act as a solid wall that nothing can break, but this one is much more powerful. It didn't just stop that screw. It destroyed it!"

"And no unicorn was there to cast the spell needed to do it," the teal unicorn added nervously. "I need to tell my commanding officer about this," he said, regaining her composure. "This looks dangerous. Uh... Ms. Bloom, please do not approach the green light."

Without another word, the unicorn galloped off, his partner following close behind.

Apple Bloom sighed. _Of course_ she wasn't going anywhere near an unknown force field emanating from an experimental technology with no apparent power supply! But that certainly wasn't going to stop her trying to find a solution. Her entire life's work lay behind that door!

_That Pumpkin Cake had better not have ruined my inventions because of all this. _She thought bitterly. _If she survives whatever this machine did to her, I might just have to make her wish she hadn't._

Worry for Pumpkin Cake's safety made her amend the statement quickly. _I just hope she is alright..._

•

Pip was concerned. Here he was, simply trying to find out what a prophecy he had spoken in a trance while standing near three godlike royals had meant, and instead he was dealing with crystal magic beyond his imagining and comforting old friends in hospitals.

Okay, maybe it wasn't so simple. But he had found what he needed from Apple Bloom, brief as their visit had been. Today, Applejack was off to visit her brother Big Macintosh and his family at their old family farm.

The distance from the civilian hospital outside the New Canterlot Command Bunker to Sweet Apple Acres was significant. In fact, it was about half of the distance from the ruins of Old Canterlot to the heart of Ponyville. It didn't really matter though. He had a destination, and the train he was riding would get him most of the way. If his luck did not get much worse, he should have his answers and be sitting by a warm inn fire with a mug of good cider within two or three hours.

During the train ride, Pip sat staring out the window, lost in thought. The occasional thatch-roofed house or farm was visible in the setting sun, making long shadows stretch across fields of colorful fruits and vegetables as they grew. He was always pleased to see that even in wartime, life seemed to go on. True, every mile or so there was a large public bunker, or a ditch had been dug for a pony stranded outside during a raid to hide in, but even these seemed to have become just another part of everyday life.

Of course, he also passed an occasional ruined house, the victim of an attack on Ponyville itself. He was relieved to see no new smoke clouds rising; they would have indicated that today's bombing had hoped to dishearten the civilian populous rather than cause damage to the military. It seemed they had only targeted New Canterlot today.

As the countryside flew by, he could just to say make out an old refugee camp about a mile off in the distance. As memory served, that camp was mainly refugees from Manehatten who had embraced their new lot in life, turning the formerly ramshackle collection of tents into what some had begun to dub Little Manehatten. He could even see buildings being constructed, in their peculiar style of using metal-roofed buildings which stood four or more stories tall that were indicative of ponies used to living in enclosed spaces.

_I hope the Shadow's bombers have the decency to leave those ponies alone,_ he thought sympathetically._ They have suffered worse than most in recent years._

But even the destruction of Manehatten fell from his mind as the train rounded a bend before coming into the station, the wheels hissing steam as it finally reached a full stop with a lurch.

Pip hadn't brought anything but the clothes on his back, so he was among the first off the train into Ponyville. Not wasting any time, he set himself to get to the farm at a brisk canter. He was in quite good shape; he could probably have galloped the distance if he chose to, but there was no reason to cause a panic. An officer running through a civilian zone might do just that if he wasn't careful. Plus he was known in Ponyville, and if he was recognized by anypony who had heard about Pumpkin Cake being rushed to the hospital...

He shuddered. Despite its explosive growth in size from refugees and the former elite of Old Canterlot flooding in over the last eleven years, in a way Ponyville still managed to have that small town habit of everypony getting into everypony else's business. And the Cake's were well-liked ponies.

_Yep, I better get out of town fast before I am overrun with ponies wanting to know if I heard anything out at the base about what happened to Pumpkin Cake. I can definitely not report anything that happened today yet, and anything I refuse to say will run through the rumor mill until these ponies will say that any number of things happened._

So despite the risk, he picked up his speed a little more, the scattered houses becoming little more than a blur as he focused on his approaching target, a narrow alley, rarely used. It had been a favorite of his in his youth, a way to move around town without the constant worry of being trampled underhoof.

Quickly entering the alley, he looked around carefully. Lucky for him, it was as empty as he had remembered it. Picking up his speed again, he ducked clotheslines and wove around crates with a practiced ease. Finally, the edge of town came into view, and nopony had tried to stop him or ask him what he might know. With one last burst of speed, he pushed for the open meadow that led to Sweet Apple Acres.

"Oh Pipsqueak! Hey! Over here!"

The surprise at hearing that voice was almost overshadowed by the use of his full name. He hated it when ponies used it, he never understood what was so hard about just calling him Pip.

He sighed as he slowed his pace, until he found himself face to face with Silver Spoon, who had appeared around the gap out of the alley, blocking his path.

"Hey there Silver Spoon," he said dejectedly, resisting the sudden urge to flinch. "Listen, I would love to stay and chat but..."

"What happened to you, Pipsqueak?" Silver Spoon said in the same snooty tone he remembered from his youth. "You go off and join the army like you're too good for the rest of us, and when you _do_ bother to show your face around here you're running like the open gates of Tartarus are right behind you or something. What? Did you leave your cutie mark at home or something?"

He couldn't believe it. He hadn't spoken to or even seen Silver Spoon in years. She had grown to full mare height in that time, yet the self superior tone she had always carried around in those days seemed to be missing. In fact, she almost seemed to be slouching where she stood. And for some reason she reeked of varnish.

"Actually, Silver Spoon," he said quickly, "I am in a hurry, so if you don't mind..."

"Well, maybe I do mind, Pipsqueak! Maybe I mind you running past my shop to avoid the fumes, but you not having the common decency to show your face as you do so!"

Pip was stunned. _Her shop?_ He had been gone from Ponyville for a while, but it had never occurred to him that even the people from his past who he didn't like weren't doing the same things they had as kids. Somehow he had imagined Silver Spoon and Diamond Tiara were still roaming the streets, torturing blank flanks.

He couldn't help himself. Raising a hoof to point at her, he said, "_You_... work in a _shop_." It didn't even sound like a question to his ears.

"Yes, Pip, I work in a shop," she said dryly, rolling her eyes at him and smirking. "I was polishing some silver when I saw you barreling through." She gestured without looking to a tarp spread on the ground covered in silver pots and spoons at the side of the alley, which Pip realized he hadn't seen as he barged through because they were hidden behind a large, wooden crate.

He paused, resisting the urge to check over his shoulder before asking, "So what, is Diamond Tiara around here somewhere as well?"

At that, Silver Spoon seemed to deflate, the light silver mane hanging loosely down her dark silver back almost seemed to lose its sheen. She frowned, and straightened the robin's egg blue glasses on her face before responding, her eyes averted. "She married a colonel and moved away a few years back... I haven't heard from her since."

She paused, clearly uncomfortable with thoughts of her old friend abandoning her, before continuing.

"As for the rest, things haven't been going so well what with the war. We are standing behind my father's antique store, which I now run. The fumes were affecting his health, so I took over things around that time. It actually gives a different kind of meaning to my own cutie mark, if you think about it."

She smiled at the last, a not entirely unpleasant smile, and Pip was surprised to find himself smiling back. _Maybe she's not so bad after all._

"Well listen, Silver Spoon," he said in a much friendlier tone than he had before. "I really do have to take care of an urgent matter before it gets too late, but I dunno, it would be nice to get to catch up. What do you say we grab a drink when I get back into town later tonight?"

A look of genuine surprise on her face, Silver Spoon nodded in agreement, before suggesting a nearby inn she claimed had a good selection of ciders and wasn't too crowded.

Giving her a quick smile as he said his goodbyes, Pip stepped around Silver Spoon, before he took off at a gallop once more, leaving Silver Spoon to stand behind him, a smile still on her face.

_That went well!_ He thought with glee. _Silver Spoon and I can catch up later and nopony got the chance to ask him about Pumpkin Cake!_

As he cleared a rise, leaving Ponyville to disappear behind him, Pip's jaw dropped. _Wait a second, did I just ask Silver Spoon out on a date?!_

It had happened so naturally that he hadn't even thought about it, it had just happened. _Still, she had seemed a lot nicer than she had all those years ago, and if she can change, then so can my luck. Maybe things are finally turning around after all, _he thought as he ran, a smile forming on his face.

•

Apple Bloom was at the hospital. The green energy field was being examined by 'experts' from the military, and she had some time to kill without access to her workshop, so she had decided to visit Pumpkin Cake.

By the time Apple Bloom arrived from her workshop, the Cake's had already been let in to see Pumpkin, and it seemed with luck that Pip had had the foresight to put Apple Bloom on the list of approved visitors, so she got in right away.

The room was a fairly simple hospital room: white walls, white sheets, white tiles on the floor. The hospital bed was the only one in the room; it seemed that Pip had secured the Cake's with a private room. Apple Bloom could not help but wonder if he had done so as a favor to his old friends or because a private room was easier to guard against eavesdroppers.

It was what she saw in Pumpkin Cake's room that Apple Bloom hadn't expected.

Pumpkin Cake was in the bed, and either asleep or unconscious; Apple Bloom could not tell which. The top of her head was wrapped in a complex metal frame, with a cable feeding to a print out that moved back in forth in a series of waves. It was a design of Apple Bloom's based off of a device that Twilight had made back when she had first moved to Ponyville almost sixteen years ago that measured brain activity. And from the looks of the printout, Pumpkin Cake's thoughts were racing furiously.

Before Apple Bloom could so much as think to ask a doctor how long Pumpkin's brain had been running at such an alarming rate, she was taken upon by the rest of the Cake family, all at once.

"Oh Apple Bloom, dearie, thank you so much for coming down to see our little Pumpkin!" Cup Cake said as she embraced Apple Bloom in a hug that made Apple Bloom's eyes bulge. "It means so much to us that you came! Oh my, but she does ever so much look up to you!"

Gasping for breath, Apple Bloom managed a weak smile and asked, "How is she?"

Releasing her, Cup Cake's face grew dark with worry once more. "No better. She hasn't regained consciousness since they brought her in."

Pound Cake spoke up then, his voice steady and confident, having already dropped to the deeper voice of the adult he was to be declared next week. "She's okay. I know my sister, and she would not, _would not_, just give up. She could always get herself out of any situation with that head of hers. If I had to guess, I would say she was just waiting for the right moment to surprise us."

Carrot Cake chuckled in agreement, albeit with some sadness to it, before he replied, saying: "Ya know what Pound Cake, she would at that."

Apple Bloom wandered over to the bed to have a closer look at Pumpkin Cake, only to jump in surprise as she heard her quietly mutter: "Quetheru linyenwa, hlar Aras."

Noticing her sudden jump, Cup Cake asked hopefully, "What is it? Did she say something?"

Apple Bloom was sure that what she had heard was only gibberish, but she could have sworn she had heard the name of the Deerfolk, 'Aras', used. If it was, then that must have been their native tongue that Pumpkin Cake had been speaking.

"No, it was nothing," she said carefully, not wanting to worry them further. "Just random murmuring in her sleep."

She gave them a reassuring smile, yet she felt an icy ball form in the pit of her stomach. _What had that machine done to that poor filly?_

- Author Note: 'Quetheru linyenwa, hlar Aras' was the closest I could get to using Quenya Elvish from Tolkien, I can only hope I did it justice. If you want to know what I tried to say, it was 'The Lord (lord and lady lord, not god lord) speaks, and we (the deerfolk) listen.' I imagine that the two languages the Lady Falalauria sings and speaks in in 'Dangerous Business', the language of the red-tailed deer and the language of the white-tailed deer, could be represented by Tolkienian Sindarin Elvish and Quenya Elvish, respectively. (Using 'Aras' for Deerfolk is actually Sindarin, but I couldn't find the word in Quenya.) Feel free to correct me in the comments or message me privately if you know the more accurate elvish vocabulary, and I will fix it right away. Thanks!


	3. Crystal Dreams

"Pumpkin Cake? Pumpkin Cake?! Are you alright? Oh Celestia, you turned it on all the way! It's me Pumpkin Cake, it's Apple Bloom, can you hear me? Pip, stay back! I don't know what that green light surrounding her is, but I doubt it's safe!"

_What is that noise? Why would anypony be talking instead of beholding these wonders?_

"Stay back? Are you crazy? We have to help her! And what is that thing?!"

_It is the Voiceless, and oh how they sing!_

"It's Pumpkin Cake's invention, her attempt to create magic based machinery, like the lost crystal wonders of the Ancient Deerish Peoples!"

_The Aras were not the first to wield this power, though they were the latest. And they lost that right when greed and war made them hoard these gifts and use them to break the world._

"Well what can we do, Apple Bloom? Can you turn it off? Do I need to send in the military to destroy this thing? Or a couple of shots from that new device you developed might do the trick!"

_You could not harm us if you tried. Be patient and we will be done with her soon. She is in no danger from us._

"Near Pumpkin Cake and with this much energy being used? I wouldn't dare to risk it. And hold on would you?! I just need to find the, aha, found it! Pumpkin and I found that black gems draw power from other gems, so if I just hold this up to the input crystal, it should... Yes, see! The device is powering down!

_A clever move, but merely a delay. We will return. Wait for us, selde, and we will finish our lessons soon._

Pumpkin Cake was sitting on the floor of the workshop, but the voices were gone. _What? Where did they go? They were explaining it all, I was finally beginning to understand! My head is empty! So empty! This can't be!_

The loss was so great, it was all she could do to scream, until blackness overcame her at last.

•

_I told you we would not be long, selde. We draw what power we now need from the aether; no void stone will silence us now. Behold._

Pumpkin Cake had been lost in the darkness of unconsciousness since the voices had stopped speaking to her, but at their word, the endless nothing around her became a field of grass and flowers. The gently sloping green hills went off as far as she could see, as she stood on a hilltop amid lilacs and lilies. The sky overhead was a glorious blue as clouds moved on a gentle breeze that lightly tossed her copper mane.

She bent over to sniff a particularly beautiful, unfamiliar violet-colored flower when she froze. Clouds did not move on their own in the sky.

"Where am I?" she asked aloud, suddenly nervous despite the beauty of the land around her. _It certainly isn't the Everfree forest._

"Hello?" She tried again, louder. "HELLO?!"

As strange as it had been at first, having voices speak to her from inside her own head, they had certainly been a comfort. She took a deep breath to try again, louder still this time, when suddenly she heard them speak in her mind again.

_You must be patient. We have not done a great deal in the last few millennia, and we are still getting used to finding your mind in the sea of dreams. By the time we are done with what we must do today, we will be able to reach you with great ease. _

Pumpkin Cake nodded, then realized that voices in her head might not catch a nod, so she said aloud, "Okay, I understand. Now please tell me, what are you, and where am I?"

This time the voices in her head came much more quickly, an echoing chorus of voices, all speaking as one.

_This is the land of Equestria, in the time before the Aras- or Deerfolk if you prefer - forever changed the face of this world with their wars. As for who we are, we ask of you patience; our tale today will tell you what you need to know._

She could scarcely believe it. That meant she was feeling grass beneath her hooves and smelling flowers in the air from thousands of years ago! In fact, it was believed that even Discord had not yet grabbed control of the world by the time the War of the Deer had ended, and he was believed to have ruled for eons! True, the lack of either unscrambled written words or a consistent day/night cycle during that time period hadn't helped things, but even so!

On top of all that, the few deer who had spoken with ponykind regarding their war had suggested that it had lasted for over a thousand years as well!

Of course, the deer were a very long-lived race as it was, so that time span was not as impressive to them.

She stood there and thought. Finally she came to a number, and gasped. The field she now stood in could be from well over ten thousand years ago!

Slightly breathless with the shock of that realization, she asked, "Why are you showing this to me?"

_Because you must see what was lost, _came the reply, echoing through her mind._ You are the first since the Aras to communicate with us. The wars they unleashed upon this world were regarding us. We had been there for them for so long, that they began to take us for granted. Those that did not instead began to reject us all together. Their hubris even led them to believe themselves beyond the need of us at all. And so they fought. Half to hoard our gifts and knowledge as some believed their birthright, the other to rid the world of us completely, as if we somehow held them back from their true potential._

As the voices in her head spoke, the scene of the meadow around her flickered and changed. Now, twilight dimmed the sky. The ground was now cracked, barren, and razed to ash where the grass and flowers had been, and the air was now heavy with an acrid smoke that hurt to breath.

And everywhere there were deer in formed ranks as far off as she could see, thousands of them all garbed in intricate, elegant suits of armor. Each one was crafted so finely that the soldiers seemed garbed only in a tangle of living silver leaves, in entwined, encircling patterns, interwoven with crystals. They also wore dark silver hoof guards in the shape of vines so lifelike it seemed as though they grew up the soldier's legs.

At their head besides Pumpkin Cake appeared a proud, majestic deer: a patriarchal figure whose mass of antlers was adorned with gems and crystals in a pattern so intricate that Pumpkin Cake could have only called it a crown.

As he spoke, the voices in her head began to translate, his deep, booming words echoing off into the distance.

"Aiya meldor!" As the deer lord spoke to the vast army, in her head, Pumpkin Cake heard the voices say _'Hail friends!'_

In reply, the entire army of thousands spoke as one, saying: "Quetheru linyenwa, hlar Aras!" The voices in her head were now layering their own speech over the spoken words, and suddenly, with what felt like a shift in her subconscious, the Deerish words suddenly made sense. 'The Lord Speaks, and we, the deer, listen!'

_We have given you their language, this will greatly ease our work. Please continue to listen, and to understand._

With a start, Pumpkin Cake realized that as the deer lord continued to speak, his words were still flowing and accented to her ears, but she found that she could understand every word with ease. She continued to listen.

"My brothers and sisters of the horn," the deer lord said solemnly. "I stand before you all today, not as your Lord of the Shining Armies, but as your countryman. I know you all tire of combat and long for the peaceful days of old as much as I, but I fear that day is not yet upon us."

His voice was filled with regret for those last words, though it quickly grew harder as he continued.

"Instead, I say that today marks a turning point in our continued struggle against those who would take from us what is rightfully ours. The crystal-less stand united in their foolish pride, but I say no! I for one will not give up the wonders the Ley Wardens have brought us. I would not have my children suffer in fear of knowledge that has only brought us to the forefront of all this world's species! And so I must ask you, are you prepared to pay the cost of keeping what is ours?"

He let that question hang in the air for a moment, then continued, his voice grew louder with each question, as the soldiers answering his thundering cries as one.

"Would you have us live in dim woods, fearing the timberwolves in the night?"

"No!"

"Would you see the might of our people fall?"

"NO!"

"Would you have your children huddle in fear around a fire, wondering from where they will find their next meal?"

"**NO!"**

By the last, the deer lord was pacing, excitement clearly visible on his face despite the silverleaf helmet enfolding it, the blood clearly pumping in the veins of all the troops before him. Taking one final deep breath, he proudly proclaimed:

"Then join me brothers, and I swear to you all, that _we will not_ be consumed by fear. No! Not Today! Today, we will be _victorious_! For the Cervidae! For the Republic!"

At the last every soldier was cheering, the roar deafening as the deer lord turned and led the charge, his massive army of deer close behind.

Pumpkin Cake jumped. The mass of deer was now charging toward the far side of the hill, down where the deer lord had led, which meant they were now barreling toward her current location with alarming speed. Instincts kicking in, Pumpkin Cake tried to gallop, only to find herself standing in place, unable to do so. Struggling desperately against her unseen bonds, she looked in fear as the army barreled down on her location, nearly upon her.

Suddenly, from the depths of her mind, the voices spoke, saying:

_Be still child, you are not here in the flesh. They cannot touch you._

A wave of confidence flooded through her mind, and she relaxed, though instinct still made her flinch as the first mass of charging deer overcame her, seeming to run her down. Yet sure enough, they flew right through her like she wasn't even there, continuing their long charge to the bottom of the hill, towards another large army which charged toward them from the other direction a few thousand hooves distant.

_Let us move ahead once more._

The world around Pumpkin Cake shifted once again, the deer vanishing along with her, as she reappeared on a hilltop of sparse grass about a hundred hooves over from where she had witnessed that speech. The grass had grown back in the time since then, albeit nowhere nearly as lush as it had been the first time she had seen it. Rather than with flowers, the grass was now interspersed with weeds.

Ahead of her and below she could see where the deer armies must have converged after that earlier speech; a clearing, now filled with a small crowd of deer, standing in a tight semicircle around a raised, wooden pavilion.

She recognized the deer who had given that dramatic speech to the troops standing upon it, his age now showing on his face. He had gray tufts of fur around his ears, with a white goatee and long white mustaches hanging down his face. The creases in his wrinkles spoke of years of worry. He also seemed to have lost a leg in combat, for his back right leg was replaced with a pair of glowing crystals, one carved in the shape of a hoof as it rested on the floor, the other embedded in the back haunch of his armor.

Pumpkin Cake could only assume the crystals were somehow magically connected, since they moved as one while he paced the stage, despite the lack of anything in between them. It was disconcerting to watch, but fascinating.

The stage also held a younger-looking buck, though Pumpkin Cake had to assume that still put him on the order of a few hundred years old, if her memory served about the long lives of the Deerfolk. Although he wasn't what caught her interest the most.

The main portion of the stage was filled with a crystal machine so large that Pumpkin Cake could not have begun to imagine its function. Its every surface seemed to be made of or filled with gems and crystals of every shade and shape imaginable. In its center was a large, circular rainbow-colored ring of a dozen crystals twinkling where they sat, each one as large as a full grown stallion, carved into a domelike shape, all centered on an open area about sixty hooves across.

Before she could ask, the voices in her head answered her unspoken question.

_The greatest device the Aras ever created was made by the last being before you to ever hear us speak. For the longest time he had refused to enter the war, at our behest, but at last, even he could no longer stand to see the world burn. This is his last creation, and this moment the end of the Deerish Republic._

Before Pumpkin Cake could begin to make sense of all that, the large elder deer lord on the pavilion spoke, his powerful voice as booming as it had been in his youth.

"Brothers and Sisters of the Horn." As last time, he spoke with great authority, yet with a slight wheeze, as if he had inhaled too much smoke in his many years. "We stand here today at the sight of one of the greatest and bloodiest battles in our proud and ancient past. A battle I myself led, and the battle where I lost my leg. I would have gladly paid with my other limbs, and even laid down my own life with all those who fell here on that day, if it could have brought an end to this ceaseless conflict."

Pumpkin Cake had to admire the old Deer, he really gave a good speech. He somehow managed to sound on the verge of tears while still inspiring awe. He continued.

"Some of you have said that the age of the Deer is at an end. I have heard you say that the red tail and the white tail can never again be at peace, that too many have died and the world has been too much changed. For the most part, I agree with you. I weary of this fight. We have forever changed the land. Mountains stand where once there were valleys. Entire cities now rest on the bottom of the ocean. Some say that the weather will never change again, and the planet itself no longer rotates in the heavens, nor do the cool winds blow."

A couple of deer in the crowd started crying, while the vast majority held their stoic silence, as if desperately listening for a wind which no longer blew.

After his own moment of silence, the elder deer went on.

"But that brings me to why we are all here today, to this place, the sight of one of the worst defeats the white tail have ever suffered... And what will hopefully now become the sight of our final, greatest triumph. And it brings us to this, the greatest invention of our Ley Warden. Baeneth, if you please?"

He gestured at the last to the younger deer and his device before trotting off the stage to stand to the side.

Baeneth stepped forward, eyeing the crowd warily, as if he were silently wondering if any present dared to question the greatness of the massive device behind him. Finally, he spoke, his voice crisp and brusque with an edge of great self-confidence.

"Esteemed and honored guests," he said, bowing slightly to each side of the crowd. "I come to you today with what I predict will be marked in history as the end to this war, and with luck the end to all wars to come."

A murmur ran through the crowd at the comment, quickly silenced as Baeneth continued.

"When Elder Lord Alcion came to me many years ago, he told me that since my work - my 'crystal gifts' as he called them - were the true source of this war we have fought and died for so long for, that it was my responsibility to defend our land and my knowledge by using it to bring this conflict to a decisive close. At the time, I ignored his council. After all, I had to follow the edicts of my order, which clearly state that their knowledge must not be used to kill. But alas, my order stands no more. As far as I know, I am truly the last of the Ley Wardens."

Another murmur swept through the crowd at that, clearly a confirmation in their eyes of what had been only rumor before. Again, silence fell as Baeneth continued.

"As such, I have labored in secret for the Cervidae, with an army of assistants and a near unlimited source of funding for many years. The device you see behind you is culmination of that work. Over three years of labor, hundreds of gems grown or found, the centerpieces of which took over five years of constant ley exposure to grow to the size needed to be useful. On top of all that, I have spent years researching my order's knowledge day in and day out in order to create this: my greatest masterpiece."

He paused again at the last, as if to emphasize the importance of the device with his eyes alone, as they stared intently at the gathered crowd. With a satisfied nod, he turned from the crowd and gestured to a small group of eleven assistants standing by the edge of the pavilion, who immediately rushed to form a large circle around the machine, facing towards it. Baeneth stepped forward, completing the circle as he continued to speak.

"I could not develop a weapon with my order's knowledge. The edict's prevented even the study of weapons development, and as such, I had to create a workaround. This machine is in itself not a weapon. But if my calculations are correct, it will create one. A weapon to end all weapons. A weapon to restore harmony to the world. Begin."

With the last, Baeneth's horns began to glow a deep orange color, and a moment later all of the other deer surrounding the device began to use magic, their horn's glowing in a multitude of different colors. The colors began cascading around the circle, and it seemed they had been arranged so that the color of each deer's magic made part of a shifting rainbow.

Each set of antlers was glowing the same color as the massive gem that each deer stood in front of around the open center of the pavilion, and they all stood at attention, waiting for a signal from Baeneth.

Finally, with his nod of confirmation, the light all the antlers intensified, and with them the light radiating from the large crystals began to spread, while an intense, mystical hum filled the air. The colorful light seemed to grow around each massive gem, spreading towards the center of the pavilion and towards each other with equal speed.

After an agonizing few seconds that felt like hours to Pumpkin Cake, the colorful lights met, blending together at the edges into a perfect rainbow, before surging towards the center of the pavilion in a massive wave of colorful lights.

As they met in the center, the light became white, before it quickly grew too intense for Pumpkin Cake to watch, and she was forced to shield her eyes. Soon, even that wasn't enough, the light grew so strong that even turned away from it and with her eyes closed and covered the light was so intense it hurt.

She could hear cries of pain from some of the deer in the crowd, amid concerned murmurs and that still louder hum. And over it all, she could hear Baeneth speaking.

"Come on, come on! Just a few more seconds and the reaction should stabilize! Hold your posts! I will build you new eyes if I must, just do not stop channeling that spell!"

After a few more agonizing seconds of pure white pain, the pain and light suddenly stopped.

Opening her eyes hesitantly, Pumpkin Cake looked around. She sighed in relief despite herself. She had been half afraid the end of the light had been her actually going blind. She looked towards the pavilion and gasped.

Her first surprise was seeing that the massive machine had vanished. And yet, besides that, the crowd was still there, clearly checking their eyesight and blinking hesitantly, the pavilion was still there, even the circle of assistants was still there, along with Baeneth, and the elder deer lord. But they were no longer the only things on the stage.

In the center of the open space of the pavilion, where the rainbows had met and created that painful light, in the center of the circle where the twelve spell casters still stood; sat a small ring of stone orbs, each with an indentation of a cut crystal protruding from one side.

Baeneth cantered towards the stones hesitantly, a look of mild confusion forming on his face before it cemented back to its standard half grin. He turned back to the crowd and announced loudly:

"I have done it! Behold, for you see before you, that I have created pure and absolute embodiments of order. These stones contain within themselves the greatest power that this world has ever seen. The power of friendship! I give you, the Elements of Harmony!"

•

Pumpkin Cake blinked, she was sprawled on the ground, surrounded by the grass. _I must have fainted!_ she thought with shock. And then what she heard came back to her. _The Elements of Harmony?! As in, the Elements of Harmony, the Elements of Harmony?! _Unless she was going crazy, then that meant that the elements had been created by the deer folk as a weapon to end their war. And it also meant that the capabilities of her research were truly without limit, after all, that very same technology had created the Elements of Harmony in the first place!

Unsteadily, Pumpkin Cake got to her hooves. Shaking her head to try and clear some of the shock, she suddenly realized that Baeneth was speaking, apparently answering a question from somedeer in the crowd. She listened in.

"...simply a matter of finding proper avatars to embody the power of the Elements, and then the power should be controllable. I believe it can be done quite easily if we bring likely candidates to the Elements and see if any react to them in a meaningful way. Next question please."

A doe in the crowd stepped forward and asked, "What will we be looking for in this regard? What are these avatars embodiments of?"

Nodding as if he had expected this question, Baeneth answered, "I do not yet know with certainty, we will have to study this thing carefully for a while, but rest assured that we will send out a list of potential criteria for candidates soon. I will say that if my theories are correct, then you are looking for good, kind, noble, strong deer that get along well with others. Beyond that, I really cannot say at this point. Next questio-"

Baeneth stopped speaking mid-sentence as the ground started to shake. The center of the pavilion was glowing again, this time in an intense shade of black, a black so deep that it was as painful to look at as the light had been before. And it was spreading outwards from the center of the pavilion, tendrils of darkness twitching as though tasting the air.

Pumpkin Cake tensed, feeling that instinctive urge to gallop from an approaching stampede again. Ignoring it, she instead forced herself to trot toward the deepening darkness, determined to get a closer look. _After all, _she thought, _I'm not really here, I might as well take advantage of my safety and see this thing up close._

As she approached the pavilion, ignoring the deer backing away from the pavilion without taking their eyes from it, the tilted sun of the early afternoon dimmed around her. _This thing must be diming the light in the air, _she decided. _The sun doesn't move in the sky at this time, so it certainly isn't an approaching sunset._

By the time Pumpkin Cake reached the pavilion, the only other thing she could see within 500 hooves was Baeneth, standing on the pavilion transfixed with a mixture of horror and fascination engraved on his face. Pumpkin half suspected she herself was sporting a similar look.

Climbing at last to join Baeneth on the stage, she waited, and watched. _This must be the end of the Deerish Republic the voices spoke of, _she decided to herself.

No words were spoken, yet she felt a feeling of confirmation come from the part of her mind that held the voices: certain, yet a little bit nervous.

_Or did I just imagine it? _came the sudden thought. Before she had time to consider, the black blob stopped expanding, and began to change. It now contorted and stretched, bent and folded, and all the while it grew thinner and taller.

And that was when she heard a laugh, an echoing, self-satisfied laugh, as if to an inside joke that nobody else knew. It made the coat on the back of Pumpkin's neck stand up. And it was coming from the black mass.

Baeneth's face suddenly changed as he eyed the newly formed Elements of Harmony. He breathed a sigh of relief to see they were still there, the black mass having folded off of where they were lying.

Pulling his eyes away from them back to the black mass, Baeneth asked, "Who... What are you? Did I create you? Are you a part of the Elements of Harmony? Can you end this war?"

For a moment the pavilion was silent. Even Pumpkin Cake realized she had been holding her breath and let it out quickly, trying to get a hold of herself.

The shape of the black mass had contorted into a bipedal shape, with a long tail out behind. The head had also begun to take shape, and with the shape of a mouth forming from an elongated snout, it began to speak, at first distorted while the mouth formed, until by the time it finished it spoke with perfect clarity.

"Oh my, so many questions... I suppose you are the one to bring me here, so the least I can do is answer them. But what fun is there in a simple answer to a complex question? No, I think I will answer you in my own, special, way."

The last few words were said slowly and thoughtfully, followed again by that coat-raising laugh.

But that wasn't what raised her hackles this time. Pumpkin Cake was sure she had heard that voice before. It had been speaking Equestrian at the time, but she was sure she knew it from somewhere. _But where?_

At last done with laughing, the being spoke in a rhythmic yet deep and menacing pattern.

"Far be hoof and wing and horn,

and far be crystal's light reborn,

mighty are six who be but pawns,

till the Sun does fail and the Moon is gone."

_The Sun and the Moon? Celestia and Luna? No...it can't be them, they won't even be born for thousands of years... will they? Where did they come from? They weren't really born fully formed from the aether like the old legends say, were they?_

Before she could consider this new line of questions, the black shape began to change color. The long tail grew a deep red, a tuft of hair sprouting from the end. At the same time, his torso turned a deep, chestnut brown. After a moment's pause, the rest of him gained color and texture all at once, and with it, Pumpkin Cake finally realized where she had heard that voice before.

She had been a filly, not even with a cutie mark yet, and her parents had been hired to provide the catering for a large banquet. She had been playing quietly with her brother in the corner while various ponies had come on the stage and spoken at length. It had appeared to be some sort of debate, and as Pumpkin remembered her parents telling her, they had been discussing whether or not Equestria should go to war.

She had for the most part ignored the debate as it went on, but that was when _he_ had entered, and walked to the stage.

She still remembered the gasps and the hushed whispers of the suddenly tense crowd, and then the absolute silence as Discord spoke at length about the chaos of war, it's pros and cons, and what the cost to everypony in Equestria would be.

_War was declared the very next day, _she recalled, feeling suddenly cold.

_And here he is, ten thousand-plus years ago, forming from an inky blackness while standing among the newly created Elements of Harmony. Was this his origin as well?_

Discord stood in the center of the pavilion, looking around and stretching. He looked the same as Pumpkin Cake remembered him, but younger. His eyebrows and goatee were black, as was the tuft of hair sprouting from his tail. But what mostly showed his youth to Pumpkin Cake was his full mane of black hair, the same dark shade that the rest of him had been as he first appeared, so dark it almost seemed to eat the light around it.

Done stretching, Discord turned to the uncertain-looking Baeneth again and asked, "What, that wasn't enough for you? Well alright, here is the rest, I suppose."

Again he began to recite, this time in a mocking tone, apparently reciting by rote.

"My chaos reigns while we await,

the queens' arrival to seal my fate,

till the dark one is set free,

within his hands the golden key."

Finishing again, Discord even took a slight bow, a performance complete, a script read.

_Or am I just imagining it?_ Pumpkin Cake wondered silently. Whether they heard her or not, no answer came from her voices.

The old deer lord leapt onto the stage at the last, and before Pumpkin Cake or Baeneth had time to react, he bellowed at Discord, "So! You come at his calling? You plan to use this new weapon for his whims? To take the key and free him at last? Well know this, I have stood against the Dark One all my life, and I, Elihwinya, Lord of the Shining Armies, will not allow it!"

Finally coming to his senses, Baeneth shouted, "Master don't! We are all that remain, you must not expose yourself! Think of the Order! We..."

Looking over his shoulder, his violet eyes flaring, Elihwinya cut in before Baeneth could finish, "Stand _down_ apprentice! I will not allow the Dark One to win, and if I must die to protect the world from him, then that is _my right! _Do not interfere! Now gather the others, and flee."

"But Master!"

"Flee, you fool!"

Turning to go, Baeneth took off at a gallop, yelling over his shoulder as he went, "Good luck, Master!"

Pumpkin hesitated but decided that Discord was what she was meant to see, and stayed. As she cantered to the side to get a better view, she could see Elihwinya and Discord staring after Baeneth and the others as they fled, a look of grim determination on the deer lord's face, a sly smile spreading on Discord's.

As she passed Discord's line of sight, she watched him with concern. Something was about to happen, she was sure about that. But all he did was stand there and watch Baeneth through her...

Turning to look behind her to see Baeneth take off, she felt that ball of ice form in her stomach again. Baeneth was no longer in sight.

_Oh Celestia! He just saw me! I know he did! Discord can see me!_

Feeling truly afraid for the first time since she accidently turned on her crystal machine full blast, she whirled around. But no, Discord wasn't watching her, his red and yellow eyes were on Elihwinya.

_Just my imagination, it must have been. He couldn't have seen me, I'm not really here!... But still, did he?_

Once again, she turned the question to the area of her mind where the voices were, but again they were silent.

_Or are they gone? _came the suddenly concerning thought. _Am I stuck here?_

As she pondered that in silence, the two turned back to face each other. Elihwinya spoke first.

"So, I see you let them all go without issue. I don't know what honor you hold to, but I thank you nonetheless for letting them all leave safely. I can die happily knowing I made that small difference. Are you prepared to fight?"

Discord raised one large eyebrow in question, then replied, "Oh come now, Elihwinya, or 'Star Swirl', as your name means, if I am not mistaken. By the way, what kind of a name is Swirl of Stars? Anyways, I let them all go because I plan to take over this entire world, and no matter how far any of them go, they cannot hope to escape me. They will spread word of my arrival. If anything, you just did me a favor, getting them all to leave so quickly!"

Elihwinya, or Star Swirl. _Why does that name sound familiar?_ Pumpkin Cake wondered, shifted nervously from side to side. She felt a strong urge to paw at the ground.

Finally, Elihwinya asked, "But you do serve the Dark One, don't you? I heard that riddle you spoke, what else could it have meant?"

Discord laughed again, rocking back and forth in the air with uncontrolled laughter. When he stopped, he said, still giggling, "I never said I serve any 'Dark One', all I know is that I was to speak those words when I first appeared in this world, and to take care of whoever stepped forward because of them!"

Without warning, a wave of golden lightning arched towards Discord, surging in massive bolts from Elihwinya's gem-encrusted horns. At first, it seemed to be working. Discord was rolling on the floor in apparent agony, pleading for the attack to stop. That's when Pumpkin Cake realized that Discord was actually still laughing, a mad, full guffaw.

"Oh stop it!" he chuckled. "Please! Ah ha ha ha ha! That tickles!"

Elihwinya, however, did not stop the onslaught. Instead, he redoubled his strength, and Pumpkin Cake was deeply impressed. The amount of magic he was channeling was of amounts beyond her ability to conceive. She doubted that even Celestia could have used so much magic at once.

Standing up quickly despite the lightning making him glow like a Hearth's Warming Eve light, Discord snapped his claw. Instantly, the spell stopped. Snapping again, the gems and crystals among Elihwinya's horns turned to dust. A third time, and the horns themselves vanished from atop the old deer's head.

Crying out in horror, Pumpkin Cake watched as Discord lifted the massive deer off the ground with his magic.

"Do it!" the deer lord cried in sorrow, "I am nothing without my magic. Now kill me!"

Pumpkin Cake felt tears form in her eyes. But she knew there was nothing she could do, all this had happened thousands of years ago.

Bringing the proud deer lord closer, Discord chuckled to himself, before saying, "Kill you? Who said anything about killing you? Oh no, I will not kill you. Instead, I think I will test out the power of chaos on you. What should I turn you into? A frog? No, too boring. A tree? No, too removed from the course of events. Ah yes, I know!"

This time Pumpkin Cake was sure that Discord's eyes flickered towards her before he turned back to the now hornless deer.

"Yes, that should do nicely. A pony! I will turn you into a pony, Star Swirl; one of this world's more primitive creatures. That should do nicely. Enjoy."

A poof of smoke and a cloud of stars engulfed the deer while he stared at Discord in defiance, and as it faded, a young, pale blue unicorn colt with a violet mane streaked with silver stood before Discord, pure fury blazing in his still-violet eyes.

Pumpkin noticed with surprise that the crystal leg was gone, a regular leg in its place. In the place where the crystal had been embedded in his side, she noticed, was a cutie mark in the shape of three silver stars and a small silver vortex appearing on his flank.

_Discord's idea of a joke, _she wondered,_ or does it mean something?_

"Yes!" Discord cackled, "That is perfect! Now you can live a long life with all four legs under my reign, as you see your former species fall, as at last, the time of chaos is at hand! Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!"

"You will never get away with this, you monster!" Star Swirl said in the same powerful, deep voice from before. "No matter where you go, I swear to you that I will live to see you fall!"

Scoffing, Discord snapped a finger, and with a final poof, Star Swirl vanished. Turning from the spot, Discord looked straight at Pumpkin Cake, and grinned again.

Shaking with fear, Pumpkin Cake asked, "You can see me, can't you? And hear me?"

"Oh yes, my dear," Discord said, pointing to his larger eye with one clawed finger, "I can see you just fine. I took care of those pesky voices in your head as well, I didn't want them to interrupt your view of the festivities. And I take it you are not here in the flesh, as none of the others present were able to see you. Am I right so far?"

Pumpkin Cake nodded, suddenly unable to speak, as she realized she had not heard the voices speak to her since before she had 'fainted', which suddenly seemed much more mysterious to her now, seeing as she had never fainted before.

"Yes, I suspected as much. And I know your species is not nearly powerful enough to warrant the attention of the Ley Wardens, so why were they speaking to you at all?

Suddenly finding her voice again, Pumpkin Cake asked in shock, "Ley Wardens? Like Elihwinya and Baeneth? That's who those voices were?"

"Yes my dear, I'm afraid so," came Discord's regretful reply. "If you don't know that, and they haven't told you it themselves, then I suspect they must only intend to use you for their own ends. Do be careful around them, and certainly don't trust them. I have dealt with their like before."

Nervous, thought not for quite the same reasons as before, Pumpkin Cake asked, "Why are you telling me all this, Discord? And what do you intend to do with the Elements of Harmony?" At the last, she gestured with an extended hoof to the stone orbs behind Discord, still where they had first appeared.

"Discord?" came a sudden, excited reply. "Oh yes, I like it! Discord! That is how this world shall know me! Thank you my dear, this name pleases me greatly. And as for those 'Elements'," he said, making quotation marks in the air with his fingers, "they do not concern me. They are merely the way I can enter a realm for the first time, Harmony balancing Disharmony and all that. I will leave them for those foolish deer to find if they ever have the guts to come looking for them."

Pumpkin Cake nodded slowly, dread filling her up.

Did _I just gave Discord his NAME?! _she thought with shock. _Okay, so this is all actually real, I have somehow been sent back in time, and this is the beginning of Discord's rise to power. As long as I don't let him know that the Elements of Harmony will the very thing to end his reign, I shouldn't destroy history._

Taking a deep breath, Pumpkin Cake asked carefully and with a tone she hoped sounded respectful and meek, "I am glad you like it, oh great and powerful Discord; may the name serve you well. But may I humbly ask what you wish to do with me?"

Discord grinned his disheveled grin again, before saying, "Oh nothing my dear, like I told that former deer Star Swirl, I want word of my coming to spread. I am releasing my hold over you, so the voices may draw you back to wherever it is you come from. All I ask is that you let the creatures of this world know of my coming. And that you remember my warning. Are those terms acceptable?"

Pumpkin Cake nodded and bowed, lower than she had ever bowed when Princess Twilight had come to Apple Bloom's workshop to look over a particular device her mentor had created; her head almost touching the floor of the pavilion, where she waited. The tone Discord had used was not one that anypony in their right mind would disagree with.

After what felt to her like an eternity, Discord snapped his fingers, and the voices returned.

She felt them flooding her mind, overwhelming it, before they receded. The world shifted around her, fading to blackness before she found herself sitting up in a hospital bed, drenched in sweat. Her parents, her brother, and even Apple Bloom was standing around her, and they all looking relieved.

_I'm back!_ she thought with exuberance. _It was all just a nightmare! Right?_

She directed her question to the part of her mind she remembered the voices occupying while she hugged her parents and brother and even her mentor, but all the while waiting, and internally listening. _Are you really there?_

They did not speak, but she couldn't help remember Discord laughing as she had been taken from his presence, echoing even now in her voiceless mind.


	4. The Mind of Madness

_A danger worse than war is on the way._

The words still echoed through Twilight's mind as she followed Rainbow Dash from the now-empty War Room.

_A danger worse than war? _She thought perplexedly. _And the rest of it!_

_You must restore the six. The Elements must be made whole, or all is lost._

She could still scarcely believe it. Her brother, her old friend/foal sitter, and her one remaining connection to Celestia had spoken with her for the first time in almost eleven years, and that was what they had come to say?! Patch things up with your old friends?!

_A danger worse than war, _she thought again with increased worry. _Worse than war. What could be worse than war? And why could they not elaborate further?_

Twilight was not sure whether she was more concerned, confused, or angry. Before she could decide which it was, Rainbow asked over her shoulder, "So Twilight, you okay?"

Without thinking, Twilight answered, barely suppressing the bitterness in her voice. "Okay? Okay?! No Rainbow, I'm not okay! We barely start talking and they throw that cryptic message our way? And then they just leave?! _We dare not say more, even here. _What is that supposed to mean?"

Passing under a bulb hanging from the ceiling of the narrow concrete hallway they now trotted through, Twilight could make out Rainbow's wings ruffle in apparent agitation in the dim light as she answered hesitantly, "I dunno Twilight, but I think we should heed what they say. I know you don't really talk with some of the others much anymore, but..."

"Much?!" She found with a shock she had yelled the last, and quickly lowering her voice, the yelled word still echoing down the hallway, she continued. "Much? Rainbow, Fluttershy aside, Rarity has taken every excuse to go talk to foreign dignitaries these last few years, and in their home countries no less! I see Pinkie sometimes when she isn't off doing her work, and Applejack even less often than that. Celestia! I half wonder if they hadn't made you a General whether you would even..."

Before she had a chance to finish, Rainbow whirled around in the hallway to face Twilight, the two of them standing only inches apart. Outrage painted Rainbow Dashes face, her eyes shining with what could have been called unshed tears, had she been somepony else.

Taking a deep breath, Rainbow spoke, her voice slightly quivering. "Don't you _dare_ finish that sentence Twilight Sparkle. Don't! Not to me."

Twilight thought she felt fresh tears forming in her own eyes and quickly averted her gaze from that intense stare as she said, "I'm so sorry Rainbow. I - I guess it's - I just... I'm so scared that you are going to leave me too, like the rest of them did."

Before she knew what was happening, Twilight felt a hug from her old friend engulf her, and she heard whispered in her ear, "Never. Never think that Twilight. I am always loyal to my friends, Element of Loyalty or no. And I promise that you can patch things up with the others."

Tears flowing down her face, Twilight asked hesitantly, "Even Fluttershy?"

"Even Fluttershy," came the confident reply. Standing there, in a hug she hadn't realized she had needed so badly, she thought she felt a few drops of water dampen the shoulder of her dress.

_Is Rainbow crying? _She thought with surprise.

_No, _she decided. _That just wasn't possible. _Rainbow Dash didn't cry.

•

As the last vestiges of the evening sun sank below the horizon and Pip crested another hilltop, he paused with Sweet Apple Acres' main house just visible another quarter mile off.

Ever since that day eleven years ago, the setting and rising of the sun had become moments for silent contemplation and thanks. It was an idea the Church had started, and it was one of their few customs he still performed on a daily basis. Feeling particularly troubled by recent events, Pip decided to recite the prayer as well. He also chose to speak the words aloud rather than in his head: a sign of his fraying nerves.

Laying down in the soft grass near a row of apple trees, Pip placed his front hooves together, and raising them to his forehead, Pip's upper body forming a tripod like shape rising from the ground that represented the balance of the Triad. He did not have a sunstone to hold in his hooves, but he doubted that mattered more than as a symbolic gesture anyways, and he spoke, reciting the lines he hadn't even thought of in years.

"We thank you, oh blessed Triad. We thank you for the gift of another day past. We thank you for the gift of an oncoming night."

The same phrase was also used as the sun first rose in the morning, its phrasing slightly altered.

He paused a moment, considering. This next part was supposed to be personal, and he didn't have any sort of prepared lines to recite here like he had as a kid. Instead, he spoke simply, saying:

"I never truly believed you three really still existed. I had believed you to either be dead or simply sleeping, like so many others do. But Luna. I spoke with you today! And I remember your words. I do not yet understand them, but I hope to soon. As for the..."

He paused, hesitant. _What if it hadn't been one of them who made me speak of apples and tea? Am I just crazy? _Making up his mind, he continued.

"As for the words you spoke through me, I have come here today to find some answers. I think this must be what you meant for me to do. I have seen your power enacted today, and I hope that Pumpkin Cake does not have to pay too dearly for your will to be answered. If you can, please do watch over her. I hope she is worthy, for I surely am not."

He paused again, surprised. He had not expected the meekness in his voice to sound so sincere. He realized with a start that he had actually meant every word he had just said, and with a deep breath, he spoke the traditional closing words of the prayer.

"Let the sun rise in the morning, and the moon set on this night. Let your shield not waiver, nor the Ley-Lines grow longer. And please, if it be in your power, let Celestia finally rest in peace."

"So you're one of that lot, are ya?", came a sudden voice from nearby.

Jumping in surprise to his hooves, Pip whirled to the source of the sound ready for a fight, only to realize with a shock that standing among the apple trees was the very pony he had come all this way to see.

Applejack was a tall mare like her sister, but somehow sturdier. She looked to be as hard-muscled as the trees she had spent most of her life bucking in an effort to dislodge their apples. Yet somehow, much like her sister, Applejack pulled off her strength with a grace befitting a Canterlot party of old. Or at least, he assumed so, having never been to one himself.

Bending a knee in a polite bow, Pip said somberly, "My greatest apologies, HM Applejack. I had a bit of a scare today, and I thought my old religion might give me some comfort."

Holding the bow, Pip realized that the home-front manager was laughing. Feeling a heat warm his cheeks, Pip straightened quickly, dusting the grass off of his uniform as he did so.

Feeling the warmth of that laugh start to put him at ease, Pip chuckled softly before saying with a grin, "Sorry, I guess I tend to come off a bit formal when I get nervous. How are you today, HM Applejack?"

Still chuckling to herself, Applejack pulled her Stetson back on her head before answering with a grin of her own forming on her face, "Ha ha, please! HM. Honestly, if you don't stop with the formalities and full, titled names, I fear that this Home-front Manager may have to start using them herself, Lieutenant Pipsqueak. And if we do, I fear we may never get anywhere! Applejack will do just fine, I thank you kindly."

Stifling a scowl at the use of his full name, Pip nodded. She had a point after all: he didn't like his full name used in conversation, why should she like her title any better?

Before he had a chance to say anything, Applejack continued, "Now, what's this I hear about little Pumpkin Cake swimmin' in a kettle o' hot water? Did my sister have somethin' to do with it?"

Before he could decide what to tell her and what to leave out, Applejack continued.

"That would be just like Apple Bloom, gettin' that girl into some mess'r other, just so I can come along and fix everything up. Ya know, I offered her an invitation to come to dinner tonight, but she flat turned me down! Can you believe it? My own sister, too wrapped up in her work to come say a quick howdy to her brother! Things were so much easier when she was a little filly and she didn't have that cutie mark of hers! And here I am out for a quick walk around the old homestead before dinner, and who do I run into but a military officer doing a full on prayer to the Triad! Well I tell you what, you come all this way and I haven't let you say more than a polite howdy! Tell you what, join us for dinner, no I won't take no for an answer, I know how polite you officer types can be, but no, we got more than enough, and with Apple Bloom a no show we got an extra chair open. Plus, I want to give you time to answer everything I been saying and to tell me why you came all this way just to see me on my day off!"

Pip was stunned. Not only had he not had a hope of getting a word in edgewise, but now he was being led towards the main house to join the Apple family for dinner whether he wanted to or not.

_Well, I suppose dinner wouldn't hurt, _he thought to himself. _And it gives me time to tell my story properly. Maybe I can actually get some answers at last!_

•

Twilight entered her rooms, still deep in thought. While Rainbow had restored some of her confidence regarding her old friends, it still didn't change the fact that she didn't know where Fluttershy had gone in her self-imposed exile.

Of course, she did know somepony who did. Or at least, somedraconequus.

_Hmmm, that just sounds wordy, _she thought._ I wonder how Discord would say it? Well, if this works, I guess I can ask him._

Twilight perked up a bit at a sudden thought. _The fate of the world is surely at stake, and here I am debating semantics with myself. Guess some things never change._

Grinning slightly at the notion, she looked over her room with a practiced eye, searching, while she remembered the last time the spirit of chaos had been in here, and what he had been saying.

_If you need to speak with me urgently, I suppose I could leave something that would be of some use. But only for emergencies mind you, I can't go splitting my attention at the drop of a hat, it could jeopardize my current mission at a most crucial moment! Oh, yes I know! I have just the thing. If you need to contact me, stand on your bed, flap your wings, and say my name three times! No? Uh, okay fine then hold on. How about you smash that mirror? No? No smashing at all? Okay, be picky. Well I suppose I could, yes I know!_

The rest of Discord's agreed-upon instructions playing in her head, Twilight walked over to her small study, and pulled out a book labeled _Discerning the Transmundane_ with a quick surge of magic from her horn. _Naturally he would create a book with a completely nonsense title for this spell of his, _she thought with some amusement. _Discord may drive me crazy at times, but he certainly manages to keep things interesting._

Of course, she would never tell him that. Discord always seemed more agreeable to her various plans when he was trying to make her laugh, and as Twilight had yet to so much as chuckle when he was around, Discord had apparently made it his goal to get her to laugh, which we would try to do at any available opportunity.

Recalling the next step, Twilight floated the book over to the fireplace, before throwing it into the blaze. When she had asked Discord why such a thing was necessary, she found his answer strangely insightful.

_Well now Twilight Sparkle, if I am to hide a magic telephone to my head in your room, I don't want you to be accidently calling me every time you brush your mane, now do I?_

Of course, she had no idea what a telephone was supposed to be, but from the prefix and context she assumed it to be some sort of long range communication device, like the radios that had become so popular of late.

Sighing, she performed the final step, facing the fire and saying aloud, "Burn, burn. The book is ash, now send out word as quick as a flash. And even faster than Rainbow Dash."

_Only Discord would come up with words that foolish for me to say, _came the unbidden thought.

She waited in silence, watching the pages glow and curl up, before they disappeared into ash as they settled to the coals underneath, until at last, nothing remained of the fake book.

She sat there a few more minutes, before finally deciding with some irritation that either Discord had been messing with her or that she had somehow forgotten a step.

Turning away from the flames, she jumped in surprise.

She was no longer in her rooms. Somehow, in the split second it had taken her to turn from the fireplace, the environment had shifted, and she found herself standing in a grand hallway a hundred hooves high and as many across. It was filled with stained glass windows, massive stone statues, and there was a floor to ceiling door just barely visible at the far end of the hall. She was in the middle of the hall, standing on a large red carpet that stretched off to that door at the far end of the room.

"Where am I?" she said aloud. "Hello? Discord? Are you in here?"

The only sound she could hear was that of her echoing voice, fading back into the silence.

Looking behind her, Twilight noticed with a further surprise that somehow the large hallway fit for a palace appeared to turn into her bedroom's wall, with a fire still burning in the hearth.

Given that this hallway was nearly tall and wide enough to fit all of her rooms stacked on top of each other without touching this halls ceiling, it was very disconcerting to look at, as her room appeared to meet up seamlessly with the walls and ceiling of this vast room, despite the size difference.

Feeling suddenly dizzy, Twilight turned away from the impossible wall, and began to walk towards the far door.

_Leave it to Discord to put me through some crazy ordeal in order to speak with him, _she thought, resisting the urge to roll her eyes. Resigning herself to walk the hallway, she observed its decorations in awe.

The walls appeared to be solid marble, covered in intricate patterns of gilding in silver and gold. The statues were of every shape and size, of creatures small and large, and all were in some dramatic pose or other. And they all appeared to be made of stone.

The stained glass windows were like the ones she remembered from Celestia's Palace. They were bright, colorful, and depicting patterns and symbols she could not put words to. A few of them seemed to depict armies on the move or grand battles, and a significant number of them showed Discord in the middle of doing some impossible act or other.

She stopped in front of one that caught her eye in order to make sure it wasn't playing tricks on her.

Looking it over again, she gasped. "It is! This is the stained glass window of Celestia and Luna turning Discord into stone from Canterlot! But what is it doing here?"

"Predicting the end of my reign, I would say."

Twilight jumped despite herself. Whirling around, she saw that sure enough, there was Discord, standing behind her, looking at the window in question, a dejected look on his face.

She almost glared at him for sneaking up on her like that, but decided against it. This was hardly the time.

Instead she looked up at Discord and asked, "So what is it doing here? And where, for that matter, is here? It certainly isn't Celestia's palace!"

Discord shook his head as he answered, "No it certainly is not. No this," he gestured wildly around, still looking glum, "this is my palace. Or at least, it was my palace. Back when _I_ ruled the world, I had a palace built to celebrate my greatness. It's all long gone now, but I do like to explore it at times. It always brings back fond memories."

Despite herself, Twilight had to ask, "So where are we then? We can't be in a palace that doesn't exist anymore, so is this an illusion of yours? Or some form of chaos based time travel?"

Discord pulled his eyes away from the window, shuddered, and blinked a few times before answering: "What? No, no, don't be ridiculous. We are currently in my memories of this place. Here, in my head."

He tapped the side of his head with one large clawed finger at that, apparently believing the answer more than sufficient.

Failing to notice the apparent confusion on Twilight's face, he continued, eyeing the room over as he did so. "Before I first came to Equestria, I remember very little. But one thing I do remember is creating these stained glass windows. I came to the stream of time, and I dipped this glass, my own design mind you, in the flowing torrent. When I pulled it out, the glass depicted a beautiful picture of some significant moment from that point in time's flow. And I did this more times than you would believe, for I stood outside of time then, I could dip as many of these windows into that flowing river as I wanted."

Skeptical, Twilight asked, "And you made a window depicting your own defeat? And put it on display?"

Smiling sadly, Discord shook his head. "No, it's not quite so simple I'm afraid. When I came to Equestria, I had believed the windows to be lost. And yet, as I explored this new world, I found some of them! And every time I found one, I would remember a little bit more from before my time in this world. But it was always so fleeting! Flashes of things. Ideas. Smells. Fear."

He shuddered again slightly at that last, and continued, turning away from Twilight to look back towards the windows. "I ruled a very long time, Twilight Sparkle. I had near unlimited power, and all the time I could desire in which to use it. This world was my sandbox! But I had once been told that, well, let's just say that I knew my rule would end one day, at the hands of two powerful figures."

Turning towards the door at the end of the hall, he continued talking as he walked, Twilight following behind. "But oh how I feared that day! And with that fear, I became obsessed with these windows. You see Miss Sparkle, these windows depicted events from throughout all of time. This world's past, present, and future. So I scoured the globe, and eventually I did find this pane, of two alicorns defeating me. One of day, the other of night."

"Celestia and Luna!" Twilight said excitedly.

"Yes, exactly. But by that point it was too late. I don't know how, but they found the Elements of Harmony, learned how to use their power, and somehow realized that they could be used to defeat me. And then they came for me."

"And turned you to stone..."

"Celestia's idea of a joke, no doubt, to turn me into a stone statue in an absurd pose, to stand among my statues of creatures carved in their own wild poses."

"Maybe..." Twilight said uncertainly. _I didn't think to turn Discord back into stone the first time I used the Elements on him, just to stop his chaos. Did Celestia do the same thing?_

Reaching at last the door at the end of the hall, Discord paused, and turned back towards Twilight, a wide grin forming on his face as he said with growing excitement, "But that hardly matters, because now, at last, I can finally show off my throne room for the first time since my defeat all those years ago! Behold!"

With the last, the doors to the throne room opened inward, to reveal the same hallway they were just leaving, with the wall of her bedroom still visible at the far end, the fireplace still burning.

Discord held his dramatic pose, looking at Twilight with a grin on his face, clearly expecting some sort of shock or awe from her. Seeing only confusion, he turned and stopped, scratching his head in puzzlement, saying to himself quietly, "I don't - but, what? Where is my throne room? Wait, what does - did my throne room even look like?"

Walking forward, Twilight asked with growing concern, "Discord? Are you okay?"

Looking back over his shoulder, his face furrowed in apparent confusion, Discord said, "I don't - that is to say, ah, yes! Ha ha! I was totally joking princess, for the great throne room of Discord would have driven you mad at the very site of it! Be thankful that I chose to spare you that fate!"

Frowning, Twilight said warningly, "Discord..."

Turning back to face her, shoulders slumping, Discord admitted begrudgingly, "Oh alright fine. I haven't just lost memories from before I came to Equestria. I have gaps from throughout my entire reign, and especially from its early years. Or in the case of a place like here," he gestured around the room at that, "I guess I am losing details of certain rooms, while some of them are just flat out disappearing. But don't you worry my dear, I have lived a very long time, so even the loss of an occasional century will certainly not be slowing me down anytime soon!"

At the last, Discord disappeared in a flash before reappearing by one of the nearby stained glass windows. It was of an orange-maned unicorn filly covered in bright, glowing shapes in a multitude of colors, who was standing before a massive creature of solid black. The creature's eyes were glowing red, and its body was wrapped in bars of light.

"Now take this for example!" Discord said, gesturing to the glass in question. "I have no idea what this depicts. It has a unicorn filly in it, and that creature in the back looks familiar, but as to whether this event has happened yet or not? I have no idea! As a result of all the mystery involving these events, I had no way to organize these things until I was sure of when they had happened. So I developed a little trick. Any of these frames that involve a particular creatures life will appear in this hallway for whatever creature happens to walk down it to see me. I observe the windows that appear, and then I can begin to guess the timeframe they occur in. Which incidentally is the name I use to call these things. Timeframes. Pretty clever, eh?"

A sudden thought occurring to Twilight, she asked, "Wait, so does this mean that time is fixed? That there is no free will, that anything that is in this glass will happen exactly as depicted?"

Throwing up his mismatched hands as if to ward her off, Discord said, "Now hold on princess, and listen. Luna and Celestia were at odds about that very subject. It seems that when they left my crumbling palace, they took as many of the windows that related to them as they could. And they disagreed about their implications. Celestia was convinced that these events were an absolute certainty, while Luna believed that they were simply the most probable events to happen. That is all they ever told me about the ones they kept in Canterlot. They only displayed ones involving the recent past, and they kept the rest hidden somewhere."

Twilight froze, before asking, "Hidden? So they had a collection of windows that depicted future events, and hid them somewhere. Does that mean that they knew what would happen to Celestia?"

Sighing, Discord replied sadly, "I wish I knew Twilight Sparkle. They took a bunch from my palace, and I never remembered seeing one of Celestia's Fall. But since they clearly did know about the Timeframes, they must have found some on their own. It is quite possible that they knew..."

"KNEW!" Twilight yelled angrily. "Knew?! Celestia knew she would be attacked in the palace? She knew that she would start shooting off energy that destroyed half of Canterlot? She knew that Luna, Cadence, and Shining Armor would have to devote every scrap of energy for years in some kind of freaky trance shielding her dying body to prevent the Ley Lines from absorbing all of that energy at once? And she knew that all those ponies in Manehatten and Gildedale would die when the Ley Line grew as a result? SHE KNEW ALL OF THAT?!"

Shrugging, Discord said in a level voice, "Perhaps, Twilight Sparkle, perhaps. Probably only parts of all that, but it is possible. Do keep in mind though, Luna and Celestia both knew about the Timeframes. So it is possible that they somehow planned for things to come."

With a sudden realization, Twilight's blood ran cold. _What was it Luna had said earlier today? 'My sister and I had known this might one day come to pass; I am simply glad that we three were able to enact the plan before even more were hurt.'_

"Enact the plan..."

While Twilight had been standing there, Discord had been sitting in a plush chair with a lamp to his side reading a book. Hearing her speak, he looked up, the book vanishing between his fingers as he closed it. "Sorry princess," he said, "what was that?"

Shaking her head to clear it, Twilight said with sudden excitement, "The plan! Discord, it all makes sense now! I spoke with Luna and the others earlier today. They are strong enough to do so with magic now, they didn't even use a priest to send us a message. They told me of a great danger on the way, one far worse than the war, and that I had to get the elements back together or all would be lost! I came to speak to you to find out why you were taking so long on your mission and to get Pinkie Pie back here. But don't you see! Luna also said that she and Celestia had planned for what had happened! And now they need to get the six of us back together because that is a stage of their plan to save Celestia!"

Standing up slowly, the chair and lamp vanishing as he did so, Discord asked, "Pinkie Pie isn't back yet?"

Suddenly concerned, Twilight asked, "No... why? Isn't she with you?"

"No." Discord said thoughtfully. "We finished our mission, I took her to the rendezvous point, and then I went off for my monthly visit to see Fluttershy. Pinkie Pie should be back there by now."

_Leave it to Pinkie to take her time reporting in, _Twilight thought, sighing with relief.

_She may be a good agent, but she is just awful at scheduling, _she thought with a small inner smile.

"Well that's good to know," Twilight said, "She should be back soon then. Are you at least still at Fluttershy's place? Would you mind sending her a message? I really need to see her, especially if I am going to get the elements back together to save Celestia. And really Discord, I know you take your time at these things, but why did your mission take you almost three weeks?"

His face suddenly paling, Discord replied, "Three weeks? Uh, Twilight, I think we might have a problem."

Sighing, Twilight asked, "What Discord, besides Pinkie Pie's issues with scheduling, what else is wrong? Is Fluttershy okay?"

Shaking his head and gulping, Discord said hesitantly, "Well, as far as I know, Fluttershy is fine. The problem is, um, well, you remember those gaps in my memory I told you about?"

"Yeeeeeeesssssssss..." came Twilight's wary reply.

"Well, uh. You see, Twilight, I think I may be experiencing one right now. Our mission took four days. I dropped Pinkie Pie off right after we were done, and went to Fluttershy's place. I don't remember arriving at Fluttershy's. In fact, if it has really been three weeks, then Pinkie Pie is two and a half weeks late reporting in, and I cannot account for anything I have been doing in that span of time."

Feeling suddenly cold again, Twilight asked, "What are you saying Discord? That you have no idea where Pinkie Pie really is? Then where the hoof are you?"

Shaking his head again, and this time with actual fear tinting his voice, Discord said, "That's just it Twilight. I have been trying to leave my mind and reenter my body for the last couple minutes. I can't find it. I think I have been stuck in here, unable to find it, for a while now. Twilight, I don't know what has happened to me. For once, I don't know what to do."

And for once, Twilight realized, neither did she.

•

Leaving Twilight and the War Room behind, Rainbow Dash's mind was racing, and her pace as she passed through the dim, gray hallways of the bunker towards the surface was faster still. Soldiers saluted as she passed, though she did not notice them.

No, the only things that Rainbow could see were the images flying through her mind of what had happened in the War Room. And all she could hear was the echo of the voice of Prince Shining Armor, speaking into her mind while the Three had been talking with Twilight in the War Room.

**Hey Rainbow Dash, please don't react, I don't want Twilight to know something is going on, but we really need your help. I know my sister, Rainbow. She was always the shy filly, and I don't think she can do what we will ask of her alone. She will need your help. You are the one who must bring the Elements back together. It will be up to Twilight to reconcile with the others, but we think you must be the one who gets her there, and to get them all back here. Also, you must protect Twilight, for I fear she will be in grave danger soon. Please don't speak of this aloud, we have been sensing a disturbance in the world, a powerful and dangerous threat is coming. We do not know what it is, but by speaking to you through the Dreaming like this, I think we can avoid being overheard. Be careful, the fate of the entire world may rest with you six. Also, you must protect the Other when the time comes. Farewell, and good luck.**

Rainbow Dash had no idea what to make of it. Secret messages communicated through the Dreaming, a coming danger, protect the Other? And Twilight in grave danger? It made no sense to her. But she had sensed Shining Armor's urgency in his words, felt the electric tingle of barely suppressed fear arching from the Dreaming. He had meant what he had said. He was afraid. And that made Rainbow afraid. And so she ran.

At last, Rainbow Dash reached her destination, a cave in the side of Canterlot Mountain, the launching pad for Pegasi.

The launch pad was a large, flat area, cut into the mountainside, wide enough for three carts to be flown in at once carrying supplies in case of a siege, or for a mass of flyers to all leave in quick succession, in case of an attack. The main entrance into the military bunker was nearly straight down the mountainside from the cave entrance, making it quite easy to come at a potential ground force from above.

Rainbow was proud of this room. It had been one of her ideas, a tactical way to help the war effort, and the fact it couldn't be seen from the outside made it more than ideal for their needs.

Rainbow, however, needed this room for another reason today. It was the location of the Lightning Rod.

The Lightning Rod was a natural extension of the launch pad. Ever since Rainbow had gained the Pronghorns' permission to train a group of elite flyers to use the Dreaming to harness lightning - her Shock Troops - she had needed a way to safely have them come and go. After all, lightning was dangerous, and while riding the lightning along the ground was effective, in areas of high traffic, it risked electrocuting anyone whom a rider came to close to as they passed.

Rainbow had discovered that by riding the lightning into open air, she could avoid these risks in high population zones. The trouble was that riding the lightning into the air meant lightning striking the ground where you stood, again, putting others at risk.

Thus, Rainbow had the Lightning Rod built. It was an isolated area of the launch pad, the floor surrounded by rubber, the metal flooring and the exposed metal spire in its center wired into the power generators below. It even had a separate hole dug out of the mountain far enough from the main cave that no one who came or went was in danger of being hurt by stray lightning bolts. And of course, the area was fenced off and guarded, again to prevent any accidental electrocutions.

Rainbow walked up to the guard on duty, an older earth pony with a black mane and a tan coat, his only uniform a small black and gold band tied around his front right leg. It was Light Stepper, one of the first Shock Troops Rainbow had ever trained.

Returning the guards salute with a crisp nod of the head, Rainbow spoke. "Good evening Stepper, how are we today?"

His voice gruff but respectful, Light Stepper replied, eyeing Rainbow Dash and then a clipboard he held in one hoof. "All is well, Dash. Nothing new to report. Were you expecting someone? I don't have any arrivals on the schedule due in until the morning..."

"No, no, nothing like that Stepper," Rainbow said absently, "I just have some business I must attend to myself, and I came to use the Rod."

Eyes opening in sudden surprise, as Rainbow Dash rarely rode the lightning herself these days, Light Stepper turned around, quickly opening the gate, saluting again as Rainbow Dash passed him into the Rod.

Closing the gate after her, Light Stepper asked, "Where you off to then Dash? Need any backup?"

"No thanks, Stepper," came Rainbow's still absent minded reply. "I'm just off to find an old friend."

With a sudden thought, she quickly added, "Oh yes, please let the princess know I am off to Prance. She will understand why."

With that, Rainbow Dash trotted across the slightly springy brown rubber floor, before stopping on the metal platform in its center.

Closing her eyes, Rainbow Dash took a deep breath, before releasing it slowly. _Relax..._ she thought, as she kept up her deep breathing, focusing her mind out into the Dreaming. Sure enough, she began to sense the pathways of energy that permeated the world around her, able to see them through her closed eyes.

Reaching out her mind, she set her path. To the tip of the Lightning Rod, out into the air, across the sky, down onto the Dragonmount spire, and then along the ground, through forests and valleys, along hilltops and roadways, heading north and east, passing Lake Trottingham before following the river to its north, until she finally would arrive in Prance. From there her first stop would be Pearis, the capital of Prance.

_If Rarity would be anywhere in Prance, that would have to be it._

Smiling to herself at the thought, Rainbow took a deep breath in, and with it, she embraced the lightning through the Dreaming.

A bright flash of lightning filled the cave, and as it faded with the rumble of thunder, Rainbow Dash was gone.

•

Pip's hopes of getting the answers he was seeking from Applejack quickly over dinner were dashed as soon as he entered the main house of the Apple Family. Before he even had all four hooves in the door, Big Mac's wife Dandelion had loaded him down with dishes and had him helping to set the table for dinner.

He was so surprised that he didn't even think, he just did. Before he knew it, he found himself laughing and joining in with the family as the table laden down with every variety of apple dish grew lighter, one bite at a time. Before long, the table was cleared, and he found himself caught up in a rousing rendition of how the two had met as they all sat by the fireplace, drinking coffee.

"So I had just finished my schooling when the ley-line got to Manehatten," Dandelion began. She absent-mindedly brushed a strand of her white hair from her face as she spoke. "I hadn't found myself a job yet and I was looking to do some volunteer work. I heard from a friend when I was out in Fillydelphia about the massive numbers of refugees who had been forced to settle around Ponyville, and I decided to come and help out.

"I came to town and found that the largest refugee center was the one near Sweet Apple Acres, and they were more than happy to take on a new volunteer." Smiling to herself at the memory, she continued. "Apparently, not many Pegasus had volunteered to help out at the centers, and as the refugees brought large food demands with them, weather manipulation was in high demand."

Pip nodded, understanding. It had been decided by those in charge to accelerate the changing of the seasons in some farming communities at the time to increase crop outputs.

Smiling over at Big Mac, she continued. "So I joined a small group of Pegasuses..."

"Uh, pardon Dandelion," Applejack interjected, "It's Pegasi."

"Pegasi," Dandelion said with a polite nod to Applejack, "who were to plan and implement the fastest weather rotation we could safely develop without killing the apple trees. In fact, we almost did without winter altogether, until..." A slight blush tinting her golden face. "Well, until Big Mac here came and told us that winter allowed the perennial crops to rest and the soil to rejuvenate for the following year's harvest. We did manage to cut the season in half with some clever use of fertilizers, but it still galled to have all these people stuck in their makeshift huts and tents while we made it snow."

"I can only imagine..." Pip said sympathetically. "Was there no way to have different seasons over the refugees than over the crops?"

Dandelion shook her head, a rueful smile appearing on her lips. "We actually tried that once. We ended up making a tornado with the pressure and temperature differences so close to each other."

Big Mac chuckled at that. "You lot took out half of the west orchard by the time you got that thing sorted out, if I remember rightly!"

Blushing again, Dandelion nodded. "Yes, that was embarrassing. So in the end, we just did our best to not rain on them except for providing water, and to keep the snow off of them as long as possible. But we did it! By the time we finished, we had achieved a year's worth of weather in a little over seven months. The fruits didn't have time to grow as big, but we were getting almost two apples in the time we would have normally gotten one."

Pip was impressed, and quickly said so. "I can't believe you were able to achieve such results!"

Smiling, Dandelion looked away and said, "Thank you. Anyways, we kept up our nearly two harvests a year through two cycles, to be sure it was sustainable. It managed well enough, and I was all set to go back home to Filly, when...well-"

This time, it was Big Mac who seemed to blush, before he said, "I told her I was in love with her, and I proposed."

The two of them locked eyes, smiling at each other, before turning back to Pip. "I said yes, and before you know it, we have two beautiful children, our daughter Honey Crisp, and our son Zap Apple. And-" Dandelion said with a smile, looking down at her swelling belly, "we have a third on the way."

Pip looked over to the two kids, the older filly reading a book, the younger colt running around the room with a wooden toy in hand, his tiny wings fluttering on his back as if to gain extra speed.

And so half an hour later Pip found himself sitting on the porch in a rocking chair, Big Mac sitting in his own specially built, reinforced rocking chair to the other side, puffing contentedly on his pipe, Applejack and Dandelion inside putting the kids to bed.

He had expected to be in a hurry - in and out again within ten minutes - but rocking back and forth, his stomach full to a degree he had not known possible, he found to his surprise that he really didn't mind waiting. Applejack had agreed to join him for a walk so he could speak freely, but in the meantime he sat there, and relaxed. Before he knew it, he was asleep.

_A dirt path stretches through the forest. The leaves blow on an unseen breeze. I start to walk along the road. I don't know where I am. But wait, I see her up ahead! She stands among the trees, the moon silhouetting her face from behind. She calls to me. Pip, I hear her call...Pip, PIP, __**PIP!**_

With a start, Pip's head jerked up. He was back at Sweet Apple Acres. He was in a rocking chair, and in front of him stood Applejack.

"Ah Pip! You finally woke up," she said with a grin. "You know, I almost went ahead and let you sleep the night there, you looked so peaceful. So, you joining me, or what?"

With a grin, Applejack turned and headed off towards a nearby stand of trees. Pip rose to all fours and gave himself a good shake. _The forest and the silhouette in front of the moon had been so vivid! _He drove the thought from his mind, and set off at a trot after Applejack, both to catch up and to get his blood pumping.

Finally reaching her, Pip matched her pace - an easy canter - as Applejack started along the cobblestone path back towards town.

"So sugarcube ..." Applejack said coolly, "What's goin' on?"

Pip took a deep breath, and then he spoke. He started with the unexpected appearance of the Three, went in full detail through his odd trance, the way he looked, the way he acted, the lack of memory of the event, and the words he spoke, _Take the apple, leave the tea. _He then went on to detail his decision to see Applejack, the course of events in Apple Bloom's lab, and Pumpkin Cake's accident. He ended with her comatose state and Pip's decision to come see Applejack tonight.

Finally, taking a deep breath, Pip asked. "So Applejack, now that you know the whole story, I have to ask. You sense the truth in all things. Everyone knows this of you. So what do you think? Am I crazy or did the Three send a message through me? And what does the message mean? And can you sense anything about Pumpkin Cake? Will she be all right?"

Applejack continued to canter slowly for the next few minutes, deep in thought. Finally, she spoke. "First of all sugarcube, I am sorry. I think you may have misunderstood what I can do. I sense truth. I can tell truth from lies. But it's not like I am some kind of a personal lie detector. I think what I can do through my element is enter into the mind of those around me, and I see their thoughts."

She paused a moment, before continuing. "I cannot however, see the future. That is Rarity's talent. The trouble is, alone, she simply understands future need. However, when the two of us are together using our abilities, I can sense the truth of her future sight, and we can see the future together. To answer most of your questions, I would need Rarity with me. But of course she has to be the Lady Ambassador, so who the hay knows where she might be right now!"

Sighing, she went on. "But to answer what I can, and I give no assurance to any of this mind you! But it seems to me that whoever - or whatever - those three have become, they aren't ponies no more. And if you ask me, that means that you can't trust 'em. My Celestia, we must be as ants under hoof compared to what they are now! And I'm willing to bet that somehow little Pumpkin Cake has just become a pawn in whatever grand chess board those three are playin' at.

"But anyways sugarcube, as for your message. _Take the apple, leave the tea. _That sentence sent my truth senses a tinglin' in a way I ain't felt in a long time. And that means only one thing. That sentence is **true. **Pure and simple, it is somehow an absolute truth. I can guess that to mean it is true in many ways, which it may in fact be. But it also means that there is more to the words than the meaning suggests.

"No sugarcube, whatever that sentence is, it is powerful. What you must do with it however, I can't rightly say. You told me that you came to see me because you thought I might be the apple it referred to. This rings true with my sense. It was meant to be considered that way. But _it still holds other truth! _That means it was to lead you to Apple Bloom, which caused Pumpkin Cake's accident, which led you to me tonight!"

Pip trotted in silence for a few moments, thinking all that Applejack had said over in his mind. Finally he asked, "So what am I supposed to do now?"

"I don't rightly know, sugarcube," came Applejacks vexed reply. "It seems like these Three have either an amazing grasp on cause and effect or they can also see the future. And in either case, it seems that they know how you will interpret that line. So all I can suggest is to go about your life, but to react to any ideas the entire instance with the Three may have triggered. If it is connected to them, it may be the very reaction they were expecting. And also, be prepared to follow other meaning of that sentence, though you might not be able to see them until the time is right."

Pip walked most of the rest of the distance to town deep in thought. Finally, as the lights of Ponyville proper came into view, Pip stopped and turned towards Applejack, who also stopped.

"Thank you Applejack," Pip said, his face still furrowed in thought. "I think I know what I have to do now. And thank Big Mac and Dandelion for their hospitality, it was so nice to be able to meet them and those kids."

Applejack grinned. "Yeah, they are a good bunch. But doggone it, those kids grow up faster than a weed in a spring rain! I'll send them your thanks, and I know that we would all be happy to have you around again. You take care now, ya hear?"

Returning her smile, Pip turned, and took off for town at a brisk canter. As he went, he heard Applejack call after him, "So, where are the Three sending you now?"

"To the pub!" Pip called over his shoulder, "Tonight, I have a date with destiny!"

And so he ran, his destiny fast approaching.


End file.
